
Class. LA^ 

Book ^5 

(ioipgM?_i 8'^<P <^ 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSm 



/ 
ESSAYS 






Educational Reformers. 



BY ^' 

ROBERT HEBERT QUICK, 

M.A, Trin. Coll. Cam., 

Late Second Master in the Surrey County Schcol and formerly 
Curate of St. Mark's, Whitechapel, England. 



NEW EDITION, 

WITH TOPICAL HEADINGS, CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE, AND OTHER AIDS FOR 

SYSTEMATIC STUDY IN NORMAL SCHOOLS AND READING CIRCLES. 






New York and Chicago : 

E. L KELLOGG & CO. 






Copyright, 1890, 

E. L. KELLOGG & CO., 

New York. 



PREFACE. 



"It is clear that in whatever it is our duty to act, 
those matters also it is our duty to study." These words 
of Dr. Arnold^s seem to me incontrovertible. So a sense 
of duty, as well as fondness for the subject, has led me 
to devote a period of leisure to the study of Education, 
in the practice of which I have been for some years 
engaged. ts 

There are countries where it would be considered ,t 
truism that a teacher in order to exercise his profession^ 
intelligently should know something about the chief 
authorities in it. Here, however, I suppose such an 
assertion will seem paradoxical; but there is a good deal 
to be said in defense of it. DeQuincey has pointed out 
that a man who takes up any pursuit without knowing 
what advances others have made in it, works at a great 
disadvantage. He does not apply his strength in the 
right direction, he troubles himself about small n/itterp 
and neglects great, he falls into errors that ha/e long 
since been exploded. An educator is, I thin^i, liable 
to these dangers if he brings to his task no knowledge 
but that which he learnt for the tripos, and no skill but 
that which he acquired in the cricket-ground or on the 
river. If his pupils are placed entirely in his hands, his 

3 I 



PREFACE, 



work is one of great difficulty, with heavy penalties 
itttached to all blundering in it ; though here, as in the 
case of the ignorant doctor and careless architect, the 
penalties, unfortunately, are paid by his victims. If 
(as more commonly happens) he has simply to give a 
class prescribed instruction, his smaller scope of action 
limits proportionally the mischief that may ensue; but 
even then it is obviously desirable that his teaching 
should be as good as possible, and he is not likely to 
employ the best methods if he invents as he goes along, 
or simply falls back on his remembrance of how he was 
taught himself, perhaps in very different circumstances. 
I venture to think, therefore, that practical men in edu- 
cation, as in most other things, may derive benefit from 
the knowledge of what has already been said and done 
by the leading men engaged in it, both past and present. 

All study of this kind, however, is very much impeded 
by want of books. *^^Good books are in German,^' says 
Professor Seeley. I have found that on the history of 
Education, not only good books, but all books are in 
German, or some other foreign language. 

I have, therefore, thought it worth while to publish a 
few such imperfect sketches as these, with which the 
reaubr can hardly be less satisfied than the author. They 
may, liowever, prove useful till they give place to a better 
book. \ 

Several of the following essays are nothing more than 
compilations. Indeed, a hostile critic might assert that 
I had used the scissors with the energy of Mr. Timbs 
and without his discretion. The reader, however, will 
probably agree with me that I have done wisely in putting 



PREFACE. 5 



before him the opinions of great writers in their own 
language. Where I am simply acting as reporter, the 
author^s own way of expressing himself is obviously the 
best; and if, following the example of the gipsies and 
Sir Fretful Plagiary, I had disfigured other people^s off- 
spring to make them pass for my own, success would 
have been fatal to the purpose I have steadily kept in 
view. The sources of original ideas in any subject, as 
the student is well aware, are few, but for irrigation we 
require troughs as well as water-springs, and these essays 
-are intended to serve in the humbler capacity. 

A word about the incomplete handling of my subjects. 
I have not attempted to treat any subject completely or 
even with anything like completeness. In giving a sketch 
of the opinions of an author, one of two methods 
must be adopted ; we may give an epitome of all that 
he has said, or by confining ourselves to his more 
valuable and characteristic opinions, may gain space to 
give these fully. As I detest epitomes I have adopted 
the latter method exclusively, but I may sometimes have 
failed in selecting an author's most characteristic prin- 
ciples ; and probably no two readers of a book would 
entirely agree as to what was most valuable in it : so my 
account must remain, after all, but a poor substitute for 
the author himself. 

For the part of a critic I have at least one qualifica- 
tion — practical acquaintance with the subject. As boy 
or master, I have been connected with no less than eleven 
schools, and my perception of the blunders of other 
teachers is derived mainly from the remembrance of my 
•own. Some of my mistakes have been brought home 



6 PREFACE. 



to me by reading works on education, even those with 
which I do not in the main agree. Perhaps there are 
teachers who on looking through the following pages may 
meet with a similar experience. 

Had the essays been written in the order in which they 
stand, a good deal of repetition might have been avoided, 
but this repetition has at least the advantage of bringing 
out points which seem to me important; and as no one 
will read the book as carefully as I have done, I hope no 
one will be as conscious of this and other blemishes in it. 

I much regret that in a work which is nothing if it 
is not practically useful, I have so often neglected to 
mark the exact place from which quotations are taken. 
I have myself paid the penalty of this carelessness in the 
trouble it has cost me to verify passages which seemed 
inaccurate. 

The authority I have had recourse to most frequently 
is Raumer {Geschichte der Pddagogik). In his first two 
volumes he gives an account of the chief men connected 
with education, from Dante to Pestalozzi. The third 
volume contains essays on various parts of education, and 
the fourth is devoted to German Universities. There is 
an English translation, published in America, of the 
fourth volume only. I confess to a great partiality for 
Eaumer — a partiality which is not shared by a Saturday 
Reviewer and by other competent authorities in this 
country. But surely a German author who is not pro- 
found, and is almost perspicuous, has some claim on the 
gratitude of English readers, if he gives information 
which we can not get in our own language. To Raumer 
I am indebted for all that I have written about Ratich, 



PREFACE. 



and almost all about Basedow. Elsewhere his history 
has been used, though not to the same extent. 

C. A. Schmid's Encyclopddie des Erzielmngs- und 
Unterrichtswesens is a vast mine of information on 
everything connected with education. The work is still 
in progress. The part containing Rousseau has only 
just reached me. I should have been glad of it when I 
was giving an account of the Emile, as Eaumer was of 
little use to me. 

Those for whom Schmid is too diffuse and expensive 
will find Carl Gottlob Hergang^s Pddagogische Realen- 
cyclopddie useful. This is in two thick volumes, and 
costs, to the best of my memory, about eighteen shil- 
lings. It was finished in 1847. 

The best sketch I have met with of the general his- 
tory of education is in the article on Pddagogik in 
Meyer's Conversations-Lexicon, I wish some one would 
translate this article ; and I should be glad to draw the 
attention of the editor of an educational periodical, say 
the Museum or the Quarterly Journal of Education^ to 
it. 

I have come upon references to many other works on 
the history of Education, but of these the only ones I 
have seen are Theodore Fritz^s Esquisse d'un Systeme 
complet d^ instruction et d^ education et de leur histoire 
(3 vols. Strasburg, 1843), and Carl Schmid's Geschichte 
der Pddagogik (4 vols.). The first of these gives only 
the outline of the subject. The second is, I believe, con- 
sidered a standard work. It does not seem to me so 
readable as Raumer's history, but is much more com- 
plete, and comes down to quite recent times. 



PREFACE. 



For my account of the Jesuit schools and of Pesta- 
lozzi, the authorities will be found elsewhere. In 
writing about Comenius I have had much assistance 
from a life of him prefixed to an English trans- 
lation of his ScliQol of Infancy^ by Daniel Benham 
(London, 1858). For almost all the information given 
about Jacotot, I am indebted to Mr, Payne's papers, 
which I should not h^^ye ventured to extract from so 
freely if they had ^^een before the public in a more per- 
manent form. 

I am sorrr j ^^^ ^ot refer to any English works on the 

history of Education, except the essays of Mr. Parker 

and Mr, ^ Eurnivall, and Christian Schools and Scholars, 

^^^^^ . are mentioned above, but we have a very good 

*^^^atise on the principles of education in Marcel's La7i- 

guage as a Means of Mental Culture (2 vols. London, 

1853). Edgeworth's Practical Education seems falling 

into undeserved neglect, and Mr. Spencer's recent work 

is not universally known even by schoolmasters. 

If the following pages attract but few readers it will 
be some consolation, though rather a melancholy one, 
that I share the fate of my betters. 

R. H. Q. 

INGATESTONE, EssEX, May, 1868. 



CONTENTS, 



PAOS 

Chronological Table of Events in the History of Educa- 
tion 17 

Axiomatic Truths of Methodology 19 

I. Schools of the Jesuits. 

Importance of the Jesuit Schools 21 

Beginnings of these Schools 22 

System explained in Ratio Studiorum 22 

Supervision , 24 

Two Kinds of Pupils; Instruction Free 25 

Subject-matter of Instruction 26 

Methods of Teaching .V 27 

Use of Emulation '. 27 

Voluntary Study v 28 

School Hours; their Length and How Employed 29 

Method of Teaching Latin 30 

Repetition, Importance of 32 

Course and Examinations 33 

Moral and Religious Training 33 

Definite Aim in Jesuit Teaching 34 

Cause of Popularity of Jesuit Teaching 36 

Importance of Jesuit System 38 

9 



lO CONTENTS. 



II. AscHAM, Montaigne, Ratich, and Milton. 
(1) AscTiam. 

PAGE 

Our Grammatical Reformers 39 

Roger Ascham's Scholemaster 40 

Summary of Method 41 

Branches of Study in Ascham's Time 43 

Importance of Double Translation 44 

(2) Montaigne. 

Latin to be Taught by Conversation 46 

Education too Linguistic 46 

Ordinary Teaching not Productive 47 

(3) j-he Innovators. 

Effect of the Reformation 49 

Summary of the Methods of the Reformers 50 

(4) Ratich. 

Ratich 's "Wonderful Discovery 51 

His Biography. 51 

Summoned to Augsburg 53 

The first to propound Many Important Principles 53 

His Methods of Teaching 55 

Similar to Ascham's 56 

(5) Milton. 

Most Notable Man who ever Kept School 57 

His Agreement with the Innovators 58 

III. COMENIUS. 

Comenius' Early Years 60 

Banishment 61 

Plans a Scheme of Universal Knowledge 63^ 



CONTENTS. 1 1 



PAGE 

Seeks a Patron 63 

Writes the Janua Linguarum , 63 

In London 64 

Finds a Patron in De Geer 66 

Interview with Oxenstiern 66 

Settles at Elbing .- 68 

Pecuniary DiflSculties 68 

Writes Orhus Pictus 69 

Returns to Amsterdam 71 

His Last Years '''1 

Both Philosopher and Schoolmaster 71 

Comenius' Principles 72 

Education must follow Kature 73 

Everything first in Rudimentary Outline 74 

Nothing per saltum 75 

Languages to be Learned Separately 77 

Classical Authors not suited to Boys , 78 

Four Kinds of Schools 78 

The Elementary School 79 

General Character of Comenius' Reforms 80 

" Gate of Languages Unlocked " 80 

Objections to Grammatical Learning 83 

Orhus Pictus 83 

Relation of Milton to Comenius 84 



IV. Locke. 

Locke and Hamilton 85 

Locke's Thoughts on Education 86 

Education by a Tutor 86 

Objections to Public Schools 86 

Good Manners vs. School Learning 88 

On Physical Education 91 

Summary of Health Maxims . ; 93 

Authority of Parents to be Established Early 93 

Corporal Punishment 96 



12 CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

of Depression 97 

Manners, Rewards, and Punishments 98 

Seasons of Aptitude 99 

No Harshness with Instruction 99 

Reasoning with Children 101 

Estimate of the Learning of his Day 102 

Children's Reading 104 

On Latin and French 105 

Latin to be Taught in Conversation. 105 

How Languages are to be Learned 107 

Improper Themes for Composition 109 

Disputation, Physics, Greek 110 

Learning a Trade. 113 

V. Rousseau. 

No School of Thought monopolizes the Truth 113 

Emile, the most Influential Book ever written 115 

Rousseau's Radicalism 115 

The Art of being Ignorant 116 

First Education purely Negative 116 

The Ideal Boy 118 

An Impracticable Scheme 119 

Wisdom of the Emile 119 

Threefold Source of Education 120 

Ordinary Education sacrifices Childhood 120 

Children not Understood 121 

Tutor's Threefold Function 122 

Vitality, the Great Characteristic of Childhood 122 

Function of Teaching 123 

Primary Impulse to Activity 124 

What Sense Activity implies 125 

Play m. School Instruction 125 

Wrong Subjects Taught 126 

Memory may be Trained without Books 129 

Moral Education » 131 



CONTENTS. 15 



PAGE 

Child to be his own Master 13g 

Suffering to be Learned I35 

Innate Sense of Right 13g 

Natural Punishments 136 

Change of Education at Twelve 137 

Cultivation of Judgment 139 

Self-teaching 140 

Learning a Trade 141 

Distinction between Childhood and Youth 143 

VI. Basedow. 

Biography I44 

Influence of Rousseau I45 

Basedow the Prince of Innovators 146 

Goethe's Opinion 143 

The Pldlanihropin founded 150 

Book of Methods 150 

Visit to the PJdlanthropin 154 

The Public Examination I54 

Summary of Impressions 158 

Kant's Verdict on Basedow 161 

VII. PeSTJlLOZZI. 

Greatest of the Reformers 16^ 

Youth, Practical Education -..,, 163 

A Noble Love-letter 167 

Marriage and Clouds 169 

Eighteen Gloomy Years 171 

Evening Hour of a Hermit 172 

Leonard and Gertrude 173 

Establishment of School at Stanz 176 

Invents his System of Object-lessons 179 

Ramsaur's Account of Pestalozzi 180 

Pestalozzi and Krusi 181 

How Gertrude Teaches her Children 181 



14 CONTENTS, 



PAGE 

His Death 183 

Pestalozzianism 184 

Cliildhood sacrificed to Learning , 185 

Merits of Pestalozzi 189 

Enthusiasm of Humanity 190 

What is demanded of Mothers 191 

Denunciation of Schoolmasters 193 

Beginnings of Development 194 

Observation, Memory, and Reflection 195 

Three Great Classes of Object-lessons 167 

Arithmetic, Form, Affections, Intellect, and Physical Edu- 
cation 198 

Interest begets Interest 201 

Use of Theories in Education 203 

VIII. Jacotot. 

Payne on Jacotot 204 

Life and Method at Dijon. 205 

Reception at Lou vain 206 

"Will Power the Great Factor in Learning 207 

His Paradox 208 

Three Great Classes of Subjects 209 

How to Teach what one does not Know 210 

Teacher must know Arts to be taught 212 

Best Teaching is Wise Superintendance , 214 

Didactic Teaching 214 

All is in All... 216 

Learn Something thoroughly; Refer all to that 217 

Great Demands on Memory 218 

Dangers of Empty Words 219 

Three Ways to Study the Model Book 220 

Power the Sole End of Study 222 

Knowledge not Power 225 

Real Weakness of Modern Education 226 

Unorganizable Knowledge 228 

What Perfect Understanding is 228 



CONTENTS. 1 5 



PAGE 

Jacotot's Four Commands 230 

Jacotot's Teaching of the Mother-tongue 232 

Jacotot's Last years 234 

IX. Herbert Spencer. 

Who are Competent to Discuss Education J34 

Controversial Tone of Spencer's Education 235 

What Knowledge is of Most Worth 237 

Nature attends to Self-preservation 239 

Knowledge which Helps towards a Living 240 

Money Value of Science, Training 241 

How to Rear Offspring 243 

Citizenship 244 

Beariug of History on Making Citizens 245 

Education for Leisure 246 

Value of Drawing and Music 248 

Summary of Conclusions 249 

Spencer's Five Classes of Knowledge 250 

No Science of Education yet 252 

Languages no longer Masters 253 

From the Simple to the Complex 254 

More Systematic Use of the Known 255 

Error of Teaching Latin Grammar before English 257 

Unscientific Teaching 257 

The Order of the Genesis of Knowledge 260 

Self-development to be Fostered 261 

Instruction must be made Pleasurable. 262 

Difference between Theory and Practice 266 

Moral and Physical Education 267 

X. Thoughts and Suggestions. 

How University Men Cram 269 

School-teaching commonly a Failure 270 

Pleasure the Means, not the End 272 

Child's Area of Interest. 274 



1 6 CONTENTS. 



PAG& 

Pestalozzian Practice ns. Pestalozzian Principle , 275 

Importance of Good Pictures 275 

Model Lesson in Leipsic 276 

Bearing of the Three Reading Books 282 

Right Use of Epitomes 283 

Arnold's Child's First History Book 385 

Needed — a Macaulay for Boys 286 

XI. Moral and Religious Education. 

Theory «s. Practice 290 

Master's Influence , 291 

Two Kinds of Teachers. 292 

True Position for Teacher 294 

Narrowing Influence of Teaching 294 

Moral Atmosphere of Large Schools 297 

Shall there be formal Religious Instruction ? 299 

"Worship, the True Teacher 300' 

Education to Right Opinion 302 

XII. Froebel. 

Froebel's Study of Nature 303" 

The Imparting m. the Developing Theory 303 

The Kindergarten m. Infant Schools 304 

Development to be based on Being to be developed 305 

Education to Spontaneous Activity 305 

Kindergarten Occupations 306 

Intuition the True Basis of Knowledge 306 

Spread of the Kindergarten 307 

In France, United States, and Belgium 307 

Froebel's Place in the History of Education. 309 

Relation to Pestalozzi 310 

Froebel's Psychological Basis ♦ 310' 

Object of the Kindergarten * ».,,.»... 311 

Opinions upon Froebel's System 311 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 1/ 



APPENDIX. 

PAGE 

Class Matches 313 

Words and Things; Testimony of Milton, Cowley, and Cowper 314 
Testimony of Dr. Johnson to Value of a Literary Education 316 

Evening Hour of a Hermit, Selections from 318 

Ramsaur on Pestalozzi 330 

Helps and Stephen on the Connections of Knowledge 321 

Dr. Weise on English Education 324 

Index 331 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE OF EVENTS IN THE 
HISTORY OF EDUCATION. 



Extent of the History of Education in Europe: from- 

Socrates to Spencer b.c. 430 to a.d. 1860 

Period covered by this Treatise: from Schools of the Jesuits 

to Spencer a.d. 1540 to 1860 

Founding of the Schools of the Jesuits 1540 

Ratio Studiorum published 1585 

Jesuits remain Masters of the Education Field till close of 

the Eighteenth Century 1585-1800 

Roger Ascham's Scholemaster published 1571 

Bacon meditates his Inductive Philosophy 1580-1605 

Ratich formulates his " Maxims" 1620 

Comenius writes his Bidactica Magna 1627 

Comenius publishes his Janua Linguarum 1631 

Milton publishes his Tractate on Education 1644 

Comenius publishes his Orhis Pictus 1657 

Comenius dies at Eighty Years of Age 1671 

Locke publishes his Thoughts on Education 1693 



1 8 CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 

German Pedagogy shakes off the Ancient Dust of the 

Schools and interests itself in Active Life 1700-1800 

General Overthrow of Routine and Tradition in France. 1750-1800 

Rousseau publishes his Emile 1762 

Outbreak of the French Revolution. 1789 

Pestalozzi born at Zurich, Switzerland 1746 

Manifests Profound Feeling for the Ignorance and Miseries 

of the Poor 1760 

Impressed by Rousseau's Emile 1765 

Founds an Asylum for Poor Children at Neuhof (New 

Farm) 1775-1780 

Publishes Evening Hour of a Hermit 1780 

Publishes Leonard and Oertrude 1781 

Publishes Figures to my ABC Book 1795 

Takes Charge of the Orphan Asylum at Stanz, Switzerland. 1798 

Publishes How Oertrude Teaches her Children 1802 

Establishes the Institute at Yverdun 1805-1825 

Dies amidst the Apparent Failure of all his Plans 1827 

Twenty Years Later, the Centenary of his Birth celebrated 

by Schoolmasters throughout all Germany 1846 

Jacotot born, at Dijon 1770 

Professor of Method of Sciences in his Native City 1800 

Banished from France, he is received with Enthusiasm as 
Professor of French Language and Literature at Uni- 
versity of Louvain, Belgium 1818 

Spends his Last Years in France; Dies 1840 1840 

Herbert Spencer publishes his Education, Intellectual, Moral, 

and Physical, . , , ,,.,..♦♦,!,,,,. 1860 



AXIOMATIC TRUTHS OF METHODOLOGY, 1 9 



AXIOMATIC TRUTHS OF METHODOLOGY OFTEN 
REFERRED TO BY MR. QUICK. 



1. The method of nature is the archetype of all 
methods and especially of the method of learning 
languages. 

2. The classification of the objects of study should 
mark out to teacher and learner their respective spheres 
of action. . ' 

3. The ultimate objects of the study should always be 
kept in view, that the end be not forgotten in pursuit 
of the means. 

4. The means ought to be consistent with the end. 

5. Example and practice are more efficient than pre- 
cept and theory. 

6. Only one thing should be taught at one time; and 
an accumulation of difficulties should be avoided, espe- 
cially in the beginning of the study. 

7. Instruction should proceed from the known to the 
unknown, from the simple to the complex, from con- 
crete to abstract notions, from analysis to synthesis. 

8. The mind should be impressed with the idea before 
it takes cognizance of the sign that represents it. 

9. The development of the intellectual powers is more 
important than the acquisition of knowledge; each 
should be made auxiliary to the other. 

10. All the faculties should be equally exercised,, and 



20 AXIOMATIC TRUTHS OF METHODOLOGY. 

exercised in any way consistent with the exigencies of 
active life. 

11. The protracted exercise of the faculties is inju- 
rious : a change of occupation renews the energy of their 
action. 

12. No exercise should be so difficult as to discourage 
exertion, nor so easy as to render it unnecessary; atten- 
tion is secured by making study interesting. 

13. First impressions and early habits are the most 
important, because they are the most enduring. 

14. What the learner discovers by mental exertion is 
better known than what is told him. 

15. Learners should not do with their instructor what 
they can do by themselves, that they may have time to 
do with him what they can not do by themselves. 

16. The monitorial principle multiplies the benefits 
of public instruction. By teaching we learn. 

17. The more concentrated is the professor's teaching, 
the more comprehensive and efficient his instruction. 

18. In a class, the time must be so employed that no 
learner shall be idle, and the business so contrived that 
learners of different degrees of advancement shall derive 
equal advantage from the instructor. 

19. Repetition must mature into a habit what the 
learner wishes to remember. 

20. Young persons should be taught only what they 
are capable of clearly understanding, and what may be 
useful to them in after-life.* 

* From Marcel on Language. London, 1853. As M. Marcel 
shows a thorough mastery of his subject, he may be trusted as 
giving the commonly received conclusions. 



ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL RE- 
FORMERS. 



SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 

Importance of the Jesuit Schools. Since the revival 
•of learning, no body of men has played so prominent a 
part in education as the Jesuits. With characteristic 
sagacity and energy, they soon seized on education as a 
stepping-stone to power and influence; and with their 
talent for organization, they framed a system of schools 
which drove all important competitors from the field, 
and made Jesuits the instructors of Catholic, and even, 
to some extent, of Protestant, Europe. Their skill in 
this capacity is attested by the highest authorities, by 
Bacon and by Descartes, the latter of whom had himself 
been their pupil; and it naturally met with its reward: 
for more than one hundred years nearly all the foremost 
men throughout Christendom, both among the clergy 
and laity, had received the Jesuit training, and for life 
regarded their old masters with reverence and affection. 

About these Jesuit schools — once so celebrated and so 
powerful, and still existing in great numbers, though 

21 



22 £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

little remains of their original importance — there does 
not seem to be much information accessible to the English 
reader. I have, therefore, collected the following par- 
ticulars about them; and refer any one who is dissatis- 
fied with so meagre an account to the works which I 
have consulted. The Jesuit schools, as I said, still 
exist, but they did their great work in other centuries ; 
and I therefore prefer to speak of them as things of the 
past. 

The Beginnings of these Schools. When the Jesuits 
were first formally recognized by a Bull of Paul III. in 
1540, the Bull stated that the Order was formed, among 
other things, " especially for the purpose of instructing 
boys and ignorant persons in the Christian religion.^' 
But the Society well understood that secular was more 
in demand than religious learning ; and they offered the 
more valued instruction that they might have the oppor- 
tunity of inculcating lessons which, to the Society at 
least, were the more valuable. From various Popes they 
obtained powers for founding schools and colleges, for 
giving degrees, and for lecturing publicly at universities. 
Their foundations rapidly extended in the Eomance 
countries, except in France, where they were long in 
overcoming the opposition of the Eegular clergy and of 
the University of Paris. Over the Teutonic and Slavonic 
countries they spread their influence first by means of 
national colleges at Rome, where boys of the different 
nations were trained as missionaries. But, in time, the 
Jesuits pushed their camps forward, even into the heart 
of the enemy's country. 

Their System set forth in "Ratio Studiorum." The 



SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 23 

system of education to be adopted in all the Jesuit 
institutions was settled during the Generalship of 
Aquaviva. In 1584 that General appointed a School 
Commission, consisting of distinguished Jesuits from 
the various countries of Europe. These spent nearly a 
year in Kome, in study and consultation ; and the fruit 
of their labors was the Uatio atqioe Institutio Studiorum 
Societatis Jesto (System and Code of Studies of the 
Society of Jesus), which was put forth by Aquaviva and 
the Fourth General Assembly. By this code the Jesuit 
schools have ever since been governed ; but about fifty 
years ago it was revised with a view to modern require- 
ments. 

Training of Jesuit Teachers. The Jesuits who formed 
the Societas Professa, i.e., those who had taken all the 
TOWS, had spent from fifteen to eighteen years in prepa- 
ration, viz., two years as novices and one as approved 
scholars, during which they were engaged chiefly in 
religious exercises, three years in the study of philosophy 
and mathematics, four years of theology, and, in the 
case of the more distinguished students, two years more 
in repetition and private theological study. At some 
point in this course, mostly after the philosophy, the 
students were sent, for a while, to teach in the elemen- 
tary schools.* The method of teaching was to be learnt 

* According to the article in K. A. Schmid's "Encyclopadie," 
the usual course was this — the two years' novitiate was over by the 
time the youth was between fifteen and seventeen. He then en- 
tered a Jesuit College as Scholasticus. Here he learnt literature 
and rhetoric for two years, and then philosophy (with mathemat- 
ics) for three more. He then entered on his Regency, i.e., he 



24 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

in the training schools, called Juvenats, one of which 
was founded in each province. Few, even of the most 
distinguished students, received dispensation from giv- 
ing elementary instruction. Salmeron and Bobadilla 
performed this duty in Naples, Lainez in Florence, 
Borgia (who had been Viceroy of Catalonia) in Cordova, 
Canisius in Cologne. During the time the Jesuit held 
his post as teacher he was to give himself up entirely to 
the work. His studies were abandoned ; his religious 
exercises curtailed. He began generally with the lowest 
form, and went up the school with the same pupils, ad- 
vancing a step every year, as in the system now common 
in Scotland. But some forms were always taught, as the 
highest is in Scotland, by the same master, who remained 
a teacher for life. 

Uniform Method and Supervision. Great care'was to 
be taken that the frequent changes in the staff of masters 
did not lead to alteration in the conduct of the school. 
Each teacher was bound to carry on the established 
instruction by the established methods. All his personal 
peculiarities and opinions were to be as much as possible 
suppressed. To secure this a rigid system of supervision 
was adopted, and reports were furnished by each officer 
to his immediate superior. Over all stood the General 
of the Order. Next came the Provincial, appointed by 

went over tlie same ground as a teacher, for from four to six years. 
Then followed a period of theological study, ending with a year 
of trial, called the Tertm^at. The candidate was now admitted 
to Priest's Orders, and took the vows either as professoi' guatuor 
wtorum, or as a coadjutor. If he was then sent back to teach, he 
gave only the higher instruction. 



SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 25 

the General. Over the school itself was the Rector, who 
was appointed (for three years) by the General, though 
he was responsible to the Provincial, and made his 
reports to him. Next came the Prefect of Studies, 
appointed, not by the Rector, but by the Provincial. 
The teachers were carefully watched both by the Rector 
and the Prefect of Studies, and it was the duty of the 
latter to visit each teacher in his class at least once a 
fortnight, to hear him teach. The other authorities, 
besides the masters of classes, were usually a House 
Prefect, and Monitors selected from the boys, one in each 
form. 

How Money was obtained. The school or college was 
to be built and maintained by gifts and bequests which 
the Society might receive for this purpose only. Their 
instruction was always given gratuitously. When suffi- 
cient funds were raised to support the officers, teachers, 
and at least twelve scholars, no effort was to be made to 
increase them ; but, if they fell short of this, donations 
Avere to be sought by begging from house to house. 
AVant of money, however, was not a difficulty which the 
Jesuits often experienced. 

Two Kinds of Pupils; Instruction free. The pupils 
in the Jesuit schools were of two kinds : 1st, those who 
were training for the Order, and had passed the Novi- 
tiate ; 2d, the externs, who were pupils merely. When 
the building was not filled by the first of these (the 
Scholastici, or Nostri, as they are called in the Jesuit 
writings), other pupils were taken in to board, who had 
to pay simply the cost of their living, and not even this 
unless they could well afford it. Instruction, as I said, 



26 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

was gratuitous to all. "Gratis receive, gratis give, "was 
the Society's rule, so they would neither make any charge 
for instruction, nor accept any gift that was burdened 
with conditions. 

Faithful to the tradition of the Catholic Church, the 
Society did not estimate a man's worth simply according 
to his birth and outward circumstances. The Constitu- 
tions expressly laid down that poverty and mean extrac- 
tion were never to be any hindrance to a pupil's admis- 
sion ; and Sacchini says : "Do not let any favoring of 
the nobility interfere with the care of meaner pupils, 
since the birth of all is equal in Adam, and the inheri- 
tance in Christ." 

The externs who could not be received into the build- 
ing were boarded in licensed houses, which were always 
liable to an unexpected visit from the Prefect of Studies. 

The age at which pupils were admitted varied from 
fourteen to twenty-four. 

Classes and Subject-matter of Instruction. The school 
was arranged in five classes (since increased to eight), of 
which the lowest usually had two divisions. Parallel 
classes were formed wherever the number of pupils was 
too great for five masters. The names given to the 
several divisions were as follow : 

1. Infima {Loxoest) | ^lassis Grammatiose 

2. Media (Intermediate) V (^Q^„,^^„tical Divisions). 

3. Suprema {Highest) ) 

4. Humanitas (Liberal), or Syntaxis {Syntactical), 

5. Rhetorica {Rhetorical). 

Jesuits and Protestants alike in the sixteenth and 
seventeenth centuries thought of no other instruction 



SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 2/ 



than in Latin and Greek, or rather in literature based 
on those languages. The subject-matter of the teach- 
ing in the Jesuit schools was to be "praeter Gramma- 
ticam, quod ad Khetoricam, Poesim et Historiam perti- 
net " (besides Grammar that which pertains to Rhetoric, 
Poetry, and History.) Heading and writing the mother- 
tongue might not be taught without special leave from 
the Provincial. Latin was as much as possible to super- 
sede all other languages, even in speaking ; and nothing 
else might be used by the pupils in the higher forms on 
any day but a holiday. 

Method of Teaching. Although many good school- 
books were written by the Jesuits, a great part of their 
teaching was given orally. The master was, in fact, a 
lecturer, who expounded sometimes a piece of a Latin or 
Greek author, sometimes the rules [of grammar. The 
pupils were required to get up the substance of these 
lectures, and to learn the grammar-rules and parts of the 
classical authors by heart. The master for his part had 
to bestow great pains on the preparation of his lectures. 

Written exercises, translations, etc., were given on 
every day, except Saturday; and the master had, if 
possible, to go over each one with its writer and his 
appointed rival or cemtihis. 

The method of hearing the rules, etc., committed to 
memory was this : Certain boys in each class, who were 
called Decurions, repeated their task to the master, and 
then in his presence heard the other boys repeat theirs. 
The master meanwhile corrected the written exercises. 

Use of Emulation in Instruction. One of the leading 
peculiarities in the Jesuits' system was the pains they 



28 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

took to foster emulation — " cotem ingenii puerilis, calcar 
industrise" (that whetstone of the boyish mind, the 
spur to industry). For this purpose, all the boys in the 
lower part of the school were arranged in pairs, each pair 
being rivals to one another. Every boy was to be con- 
stantly on the watch, to catch his rival tripping, and was 
immediately to correct him. Besides this individual 
rivalry, every class was divided into two hostile camps, 
called Eome and Carthage, which had frequent pitched 
battles of questions on set subjects. These were the 
" Ooncertations," in which the boys sometimes had to 
put questions to the opposite camp, sometimes to expose 
erroneous answers when the questions were asked by the 
master. Emulation, indeed, was encouraged to a point 
where, as it seems to me, it must have endangered the 
good feeling of the boys among themselves. Jouvency 
mentions a practice of appointing mock defenders of any 
particularly bad exercise, who should make the author of 
it ridiculous by their excuses ; and any boy, whose work 
was very discreditable, was placed on a form by himself, 
with a daily punishment, until he could show that some 
one deserved to change places with him. 

Associations for Voluntary Study. In the higher 
classes, a better kind of rivalry was cultivated by means 
of *^ Academies," i.e., voluntary associations for study, 
which met together, under the superintendence of a 
master, to read themes, translations, etc., and to discuss 
passages from the classics. The new members were 
elected by the old, and to be thus elected was a much- 
coveted distinction. In these Academies the clever 
students got practice for the disputations, which formed 



SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 29 

an important part of the school work of the higher 
classes. 

Appeals to Self-Respect. There was a vast number of 
other expedients by which the Jesuits sought to work on 
their pupils' amour propre (self-esteem), such as, on the 
one hand, the weekly publication of offenses pei^ prce- 
conem (by the crier), and, on the other, besides prizes 
(which could be won only by the externs), titles, and 
badges of honor, and the like. It appears that in each 
class a kind of magistracy was formed, who, as praetors, 
censors, etc., had in some cases to try delinquents. 
*^ There are,'' says Jouvency, ^^ hundreds of expedients 
of this sort, all tending to sharpen the boys' wits, to 
lighten the labor of the master, and to free him from 
the invidious and troublesome necessity of punishing." 

School-hours, their Length and how Employed. The 
school-hours were remarkably short: two hours and a 
half in the morning, and the same in the afternoon, 
with a whole holiday a week in summer, and a half 
holiday in winter. The time was spent in the first 
form after the following manner: During the first half- 
hour, the master corrected the exercises of the previous 
day, while the Decurions heard the lesson which had 
been learnt by heart. Then the master heard the piece 
of Latin which he had explained on the previous day. 
With this construing was connected a great deal of pars- 
ing, conjugating, declining, etc. The teacher then ex- 
plained the piece for the following day, which, in this 
form, was never to exceed four lines. The last half- 
hour of the morning was spent in explaining grammar. 
This was done very slowly and carefully. In the words 



30 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS, 



of the Ratio Studd. : " Pluribus diebus fere singula 
prfficepta inculcanda sunt/^ (On many days not more 
than a single rule or maxim is to be taught.) For the 
first hour of the afternoon, the master corrected ex- 
ercises, and the boys learnt grammar. If there was 
time, the master put questions about the grammar he 
had explained in the morning. The second hour was 
taken up with more explanations of grammar, and the 
school closed with half an hour's concertation, or the 
master corrected the notes which the pupils had taken 
during the day. In the other forms, the work was very 
similar to this, except that Greek was added, and also 
in the higher classes a little mathematics. 

Method of Teaching the Latin Language. It will be 
observed, from the above account, that almost all the 
strength of the Jesuit teaching was thrown into the 
study of the Latin language, which was to be used, not 
only for reading, but also in writing and speaking. But 
some amount of instruction in other subjects, especially 
in history and geography, was given in explaining, or 
rather lecturing on, the classical authors. Jouvency 
says that this lecture must consist of the following 
parts: 1st, the general meaning of the whole passage; 
2d, the explanation of each clause, both as to the mean- 
ing and construction ; 3d, any information, such as ac- 
counts of historical events, or of ancient manners and 
customs, which could be connected with the text; 4th, 
in the higher forms, applications of the rules of rhetoric 
and poetry; 5th, an examination of the Latinity; 6th, 
the inculcation of some moral lesson. This treatment 
of a subject he illustrates by examples. Among these 



SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 3 1 



is an account of a lesson for the first (i.e. lowest) class 
in the Fable of the Fox and the Mask: 1st, comes the 
argument and the explanation of words; 2d, the gram- 
mar and parsing, as vulpes (fox), a substantive of the 
third declension, etc., \ik.e proles (offspring), clades (de- 
struction), etc. (here the master is always to give among 
his examples some which the boys already know) ; 3d, 
comes tlieeruditio (scholarship) — something about foxes, 
about tragedy, about the brain; and hence about other 
parts of the head; 4th, the Latinity, the order of the 
words, choice of words, synonyms, etc. Then the sen- 
tences may be parodied; other suitable substantives may 
be found for the adjectives, and vice versa, and every 
method is to be adopted of showing the boys how to 
iise the words they have learnt. Lastly, comes the 
moral. 

How Attention was Secured. The practical teacher 
will be tempted to ask. How is the attention of the class 
to be kept up whilst all this information is given ? This 
the Jesuits did partly by punishmg the inattentive. 
Every boy was subsequently required to reproduce what 
the teacher had said, and to show his written notes of 
it. But no doubt this matter of attention was found a 
difficulty. Jouvency tells the teachers to break off from 
time to time in their lectures, and to ask questions; and 
he adds : ^' Varige sunt artes excitandse attentionis quas 
docebit usus et sua cuique industria suggeret.^' (There 
are many ways of arousing the attention which each one's 
experience and industry will suggest to him.) 

Private Study. For private study, besides written 
exercises and learning by heart, the pupils were recom- 



32 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

mended subjects to get up in their own time; and in 
this, and also as to the length of some of the regular 
lessons, they were permitted to decide for themselves. 
Here, as everywhere, the Jesuits trusted to the sense of 
honor and emulation — those who did extra work were 
praised and rewarded. 

Repetition the Mother of Learning. One of the max- 
ims of this system was: ^^ Repetitio mater studiorum." 
Every lesson was connected with two repetitions — one 
before it began, of preceding work, and the other at 
the close, of the work just done. Besides this, one day 
a week was devoted entirely to repetition. In the three 
lowest classes the desire of laying a solid foundation 
even led to the second six months in the year being 
given to again going over the work of the first six 
months. By this means, boys of extraordinary ability 
could pass through these forms in eighteen months, in- 
stead of three years. 

Thorough Knowledge Required. Thoroughness in 
work was the one thing insisted on. Sacchini says that 
much time should be spent in going over the more im- 
portant things, which are '' veluti multorum f ontes et 
capita ;" and that the master should prefer to teach a 
few things perfectly to giving indistinct impressions of 
many things. We should remember, however, that 
there were usually no pupils in the Jesuit schools under 
fourteen years of age. Subjects such as grammar can 
not, by any expenditure of time and trouble, be per- 
fectly taught to children, because they can not perfectly 
understand them; so that the Jesuit thoroughness is not 
always attainable. 



SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 33 

Length of Course: Examinations. The usual duration 
of the course in the lower schools was six years — i.e, 
^ne year in each of the four lower classes, and two years 
in the highest class. Every year closed with a very for- 
mal examination. Before this examination took place, 
the pupils had lessons in the manner of it, so that they 
might come prepared, not only with a knowledge of 
the subjects, but also of the laws of writing for examina- 
tion. The examination was conducted by a commission 
appointed for the purpose, of which commission the 
Prefect of Studies was an ex-officio member. The mas- 
ters of the classes, though they were present, and could 
make remarks, were not of the examining body. For 
the viva voce the boys were ushered in, three at a time, 
before the solemn conclave. The results of the exami- 
nation, both written and verbal, were joined with the 
records of the work done in the past year; and the 
names of those pupils who had distinguished themselves 
were then published in order of merit, but the poll was 
arranged alphabetically, or according to birthplace. 

Moral and Religious Training: Health. As might be 
expected, the Jesuits were to be very careful of the moral 
and religious training of their pupils. " Quam maxim e 
in vitae probitate ac bonis artibus doctrinaque proficiant 
ad Dei gloriam." (That as much as possible they should 
make progress in uprightness of life, and in good con- 
duct and learning to the glory of God.) {Ratio Shcdd.y 
quoted by Schmid.) And Sacchini tells the master to 
remember how honorable his office is ; as it has to do, 
not with grammar only, but also with the science and 
practice of a Christian and religious life. 



34 £SSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Each lesson was to begin with prayer or the sign of 
the cross. The pupils were to hear mass eyery morn- 
ing, and were to be urged to frequent confession and 
receiving of the Holy Communion. 

The bodily health also was to be carefully attended 
to. The pupils were not to study too much or too long 
at a time. Nothing was to be done for a space of from 
one to two hours after dinner. On holidays excursions 
were made to farms in the country. 

Punishments. Punishments were to be as light as 
possible, and the master was to shut his eyes to offenses 
whenever he thought he might do so with safety. Grave 
offenses were to be visited with flogging, performed by a 
"corrector,'^ who was not a member of the Order, 
Where flogging did not have a good effect the pupil was 
to be expelled. 

Definite Aim of Jesuit Teaching. The dry details into 
which I have been drawn by faithfully copying the man- 
ner of the Ratio Studiorum may seem to the reader to 
afford no answer to the question which naturally sug- 
gests itself — To what did the school-system of the 
Jesuits owe its enormous popularity ? But in part, at 
least, these details do afford an answer. They show us 
that the Jesuits were intensely practical. The title 
Ratio iStudiorum has been called a misnomer, for the 
book so designated hardly contains a single principle ; 
but what it does is this — it points out a perfectly attain- 
able goal, and carefully defines the road by which that 
goal is to be approached. For each class was prescribed 
not only the work to be done, but also the end to be 
kept in view. Thus method reigned throughout; — per- 



SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 35 

haps not the best method, as the object to be attained 
was assuredly not the highest object ; but the method, 
such as it was, was applied with undeviating exactness. 
In this particular the Jesuit schools contrasted strongly 
with their rivals of old, as indeed with the ordinary 
school of the present day. The Head Master, who is 
to the modern English school what the General, Pro- 
vincial, Eector, Prefect of Studies, and Ratio Studio^ 
rum combined were to a school of the Jesuits, has per- 
haps no standard in view up to which the boy should 
have been brought when his school course is completed. 
The masters of forms teach just those portions of their 
subject in which they themselves are interested, in any 
way that occurs to them, with by no means uniform suc- 
cess; so that when two forms are examined with the 
same examination paper, it is no very uncommon occur- 
rence for the lower to be found superior to the higher. 
It is, perhaps, to be expected that a course in which uni- 
form method tends to a definite goal would on the whole 
be more successful than one in which a boy has to ac- 
custom himself by turns to half-a-dozen different meth- 
ods, invented at haphazard by individual masters with 
different aims in view, if indeed they have any aim at 
all. 

Jesuit Schools trained merely the Receptive and Re- 
productive Powers. I have said that the object which 
the Jesuits proposed in their teaching was not the high- 
est object. They did not aim at developing all the fac- 
ulties of their pupils, but merely the receptive and 
reproductive faculties. When the young man had ac- 
quired a thorough mastery of the Latin language for all 



36 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

purposes, when he was well versed in the theological and 
philosophical opinions of his preceptors, when he was 
skillful in dispute, and could make a brilliant display 
from the resources of a well-stored memory, he had 
reached the highest point to which the Jesuits sought 
to lead him. Originality and independence of mind, 
love of truth for its own sake, the power of reflecting,. 
and of forming correct judgments, were not merely neg- 
lected — they were suppressed in the Jesuit's system. But 
in what they attempted they were eminently successful,, 
and their success went a long way toward securing their 
popularity.* 

Cause of Popularity. Their popularity was due, more- 
over, to the means employed, as well as to the result at« 
tained. The Jesuit teachers were to lead, not drive 
their pupils, to make ''^disciplinam non modo tolerabi- 
lem, sed etiam amabilem." (Not only bearable but also 
pleasant.) Sacchini expresses himself very forcibly on 
this subject. "It is," says he, "the unvarying decision 
of wise men, whether in ancient or modern times, that 
the instruction of youth will always be best when it is 
pleasantest : whence this application of the word ludus^ 
The tenderness of youth requires of us that we should 
not overstrain it, its innocence that we should abstain 
from harshness. . . . That which enters into willing 
ears the mind as it were runs to welcome, seizes with 

*Ranke, speaking of the success of the Jesuit schools, says : "It 
was found that young persons learned more under them in half a 
year than with others in two years. Even Protestants called back 
their children from distant schools, and put them under the care 
of the Jesuits."— ^is^. of Popes, book v.; p. 138. Kelley's Trans » 



SCHOOLS OF THE JESUITS. 3/ 

avidity, carefully stows away, and faithfully preserves/^ 
The pupils were therefore to be encouraged in every way 
to take kindly to their learning. With this end in view 
(and no doubt other objects also), the masters were care- 
fully to seek the boys^ affections. " When pupils love 
the master/^ says Sacchini, " they will soon love his teach- 
ing. Let him, therefore, show an interest in everything 
that concerns them and not merely in their studies. 
Let him rejoice with those that rejoice, and not disdain 
to weep with those that weep. After the example of 
the Apostle let him become a little one amongst little ones, 
that he may make them adult in Christ, and Christ adult 
in them. . . Let him unite the grave kindness and 
authority of a father with a mother^s tenderness. 

Learning to be made Pleasant. In order that learn- 
ing might be pleasant to the pupils, it was necessary that 
they should not be overtasked. To avoid this the master 
had to study the character and capacity of each boy in 
his class, and to keep a book with all particulars about 
him, and marks from one to six indicating proficiency. 
Thus the master formed an estimate of what should be re- 
quired,and the amount varied considerably with the pupil, 
though the quality of the work was always to be good. 
Not only was the work not be excessive, it was never to 
be of great difficulty. Even the grammar was to be made 
as easy and attractive as possible. ^^ I think it a mis- 
take," says Sacchini, " to introduce at an early stage the 
more thorny difficulties of grammar : ... for when the 
pupils have become familiar with the easier parts, use 
will, by degrees, make the more difficult clear to them. 
His mind expanding and his judgment ripening as he 



38 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

grows older, the pupil will often see for himself that 
-which he could hardly be made to see by others. More- 
over, in reading an author, examples of grammatical 
difficulties will be more easily observed in connection 
with the context, and will make more impression on the- 
mind, than if they are taught in an abstract form by 
themselves. Let them, then, be carefully explained 
whenever they occur. ^^ 

In collecting these particulars about the Jesuit schools,. 
I have considered not how this or that might be used in 
attacking or defending the Order, but, simply, what 
would be of most interest to those who are engaged in 
education. 

Importance of Jesuit System. No other school system 
has been built up by the united efforts of so many astute 
intellects ; no other system has met with so great success^ 
or attained such wide-spread influence. It deserves, 
therefore, our careful consideration; and, however little- 
we may approve that system, and wish to imitate it as a 
whole, it may suggest to us not a few useful reflections; 
on our own practice ; may lead us to be clearer in our 
aims ; and to value more highly a well-organized plan of 
instruction — without which even humble aims will 
mostly prove unattainable. 



ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICff, MILTON. 39 

IL 

ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICH, MILTON. 

Our Grammatical Reformers. Masters and scholars 
"who sigh over what seem to them the intricacies and 
obscurities of the '^Headmasters' Primer" may find 
some consolation in thinking that, after all, matters 
might have been worse, and that their fate is enviable 
indeed compared with that of the students of Latin 400 
years ago. Did the reader ever open the " Doctrinale " 
of Alexander de Villa Dei, which was the grammar in 
general use from the middle of the thirteenth to the end 
of the fifteenth century ? If so, he is aware how great a 
step toward simplicity was made by our grammatical re- 
formers, Lily, Colet, and Erasmus. Indeed, those whom 
we now regard as the forgers of our chains were, in their 
own opinion and that of their contemporaries, the cham- 
pions of freedom. 

Rules to be studied in the Authors themselves. I 
have given elsewhere a remarkable passage from Colet, 
in which he recommends the learning of rules and the 
study of examples in good Latin authors. Wolsey also, 
in his directions to the masters of Ipswich School (dated 
1528), proposes that the boys should be exercised in the 
eight parts of speech in the first form, and should begin 
to speak Latin and translate from English into Latin in 
the second. If the masters think fit, they may also let 



40 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

the pupils read Lily's '^ Carmen Monitorium/' or Oato's 
" Disticlis." From, the third upward a regular course of 
classical authors was to be read, and Lily's rules were to 
be introduced by degrees. " Although I confess such 
things are necessary/' writes Wolsey, ^'yet, as far as pos- 
sible, we could wish them so appointed as not to occupy 
the more valuable part of the day." Only in the sixth 
form, the highest but two, Lily's syntax was to be begun. 
In these schools the boys' time was wholly taken up 
with Latin, and the speaking of Latin was enforced even 
in play hours, so we see that anomalies in the Accidence 
as taught in the As in 2)r(Bsenti were not given till the 
boys had been some time using the language; and the 
syntax was kept until they had a good practical knowl- 
edge of the usages to which the rules referred. 

Roger Ascham's " Scholemaster. " These great men, how- 
ever, though they showed the interest they took in the 
instruction of the young, and the insight they had into 
the art of teaching, never attempted a perfect treatise 
on the subject. This was done some fifty years after- 
ward by the celebrated Eoger Ascham in his " Schole- 
master." If laiidari a laudatis (to be praised by the 
famous) is any test of merit, we may assume that this 
book is still deserving of attention. '' It contains, per- 
haps," says Dr. Johnson, "the best advice that was ever 
given for the study of languages."* And Mr. J. E. B. 
Mayor (no mean authority) ventures on a still stronger 
assertion. " This book sets forth," says he, " the only 
sound method of acquiring a dead la^iguage" Mr. 
Oeorge Long has also borne witness on the same side. 

* Life qf Ascham. 



ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICH, MILTON, 4I 

And yet, I believe, few teachers of the dead languages 
have read Ascham's book, or know the method he pro- 
• poses. I will, therefore, give an account of it, as nearly 
as I can, in Ascham's own words. 

Summary of Ascham's Method. Latin is to be taught 
as follows : First, let tlie child learn the eight parts of 
speech, and then the right joining together of substan- 
tives with adjectives, the noun with the verb, the relative 
with the antecedent. After the concords are learned, 
let the master take Sturm^s selection of Cicero's Epistles, 
and read them after this manner : " first, let him teach 
the child, cheerfully and plainly, the cause and matter 
of the letter ; then, let him construe it into English so 
oft as the child may easily carry away the understanding 
of it; lastly, parse it over perfectly. This done, then 
let the child by and by both construe and parse it over 
again; so that it may appear that the child doubteth in 
nothing that his master has taught him before. After 
this, the child must take a paper book, and, sitting in 
some place where no man shall prompt him, by himself 
let him translate into English his former lesson. Then 
showing it to his master, let the master take from him 
his Latin book, and pausing an hour at the least, then 
let the child translate his own English into Latin again 
in another paper book. When the child bringeth it 
turned into Latin, the master must compare it with 
Tully's book, and lay them both together, and where 
the child doth well, praise him, where amiss point out 
why Tully's use is better. Thus the child will easily 
acquire a knowledge of grammar, and also the ground 
of almost all the rules that are so busily taught by the 



42 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

master, and so hardly learned by the scholar in all com- 
mon schools." '^We do not condemn rules, but we 
gladly teach rules; and teach them more plainly, sen- 
sibly, and orderly, than they be commonly taught in 
common schools. For when the master shall compare 
Tully's book with the scholars' translation, let the master 
at the first lead and teach the scholar to join the rules 
of his grammar book with the examples of his present 
lesson, until the scholar by himself be able to fetch out 
of his grammar every rule for every example ; and let 
the grammar book be ever in the scholars' hand, and also 
used by him as a dictionary for every present use. This 
is a lively and perfect way of teaching of rules ; where 
the common way used in common schools to read the 
grammar alone by itself is tedious for the master, hard 
for the scholar, cold and uncomfortable for them both.'*' 
And elsewhere Ascham says : " Yea I do wish that all 
rules for young scholars were shorter than they be. 
For, without doubt, grammatica itself is sooner and 
surer learned by examples of good authors than by the 
naked rules of grammarians." 

" As you perceive your scholar to go better on away, 
first, with understanding his lesson more quickly, with 
parsing more readily, with translating more speedily and 
perfectly than he was wont ; after, give him longer les- 
sons to translate, and, withal, begin to teach him, both 
in nouns and verbs, what is proprium (the general 
meaning of the word) and what is translatum (meaning^ 
of the word in the particular passage), what synonymum 
(words of like meaning), what diversum (words of con- 
trasted meaning), which be contraria (words of opposite 



ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICH, MILTON. 



meaning), and whicli be most notable ])lirases, in all 
lectures, as — 

Proprium . . Rex sepultus est magnifice. (The king 

was buried magnificently.) 
Translatum , . Cum illo principe, sepulta est et gloria et 

salus reipublica3. (With that prince the 

glory and safety of the republic was 

buried.) 
Synonyma . , Ensis, gladius, laudare, praedicare. (Sword, 

sword, to praise, to admonish.) 
Piversa , . . Diligere, amare, colere, exardescere, in- 

imicus, hostis. (To esteem, to love, to 

cherish, to be inflamed, a foe, an enemy.) 
Contraria . . . Acerbum et luctuosum bellum, dulcis et 

laeta pax. (War is bitter and grievous ; 

peace is sweet and joyful.) 
Phrases . , . Dare verba, abjicere obedientiam. (To 

give empty words, i.e., to deceive, to 

throw off obedience.) 

Every lesson is to be thus carefully analyzed, and 
entered under these headings in a third MS. book. 

Method of Teaching Latin Composition. All this time, 
though the boy is to work over some Terence, he is to 
speak no Latin. Subsequently the master must trans- 
late easy pieces from Cicero into English, and the boy, 
without having seen the original passage, is required to 
put the English into Latin. His translation must then 
be carefully compared with the original, for ^^ of good 
heed-taking springeth chiefly knowledge." 

Branches of Study. In the Second Book of the 
'^ Scholemaster," Ascham discusses the various branches 
of the study then common, viz. : 1. Translatio lingua- 
rum (Translation); 2. Paraphrasis (Paraphrase); 3. Meta- 



ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

irasis (Metaphrase) ; 4. Epitome (Abridgment); 5. Imi- 
atio (Imitation); 6. Declamatio (Declamation). He 
does not lay much stress on any of these, except trans- 
latio and imitatio. Of the last he says: ^^All languages, 
both learned and mother-tongue, be gotten, and gotten 
only by imitation. For, as ye use to hear, so ye use to 
speak ; if ye hear no other, ye speak not yourself ; and 
whom ye only hear, of them ye only lea^n." But trans- 
lation was his great instrument of all kinds of learning. 
"The translation," he says, "is the most common and 
most commendable of all other exercises for youth ; most 
common, for all your constructions in grammar schools 
be nothing else but translations, but because they be not 
douole translations (as I do require) they bring forth but 
simple and single commodity : and- because also they 
lack the daily use of writing, which is the only thing that 
breedeth deep root, both in the wit for good understand- 
ing and in the memory for sure keeping of all that is 
learned ; most commendable also, and that by the judg- 
ment of all authors which entreat of these exercises." 

Importance of Double Translation. After quoting 
Pliny, he says: " You perceive how Pliny teacheth that 
by this exercise of double translating is learned easily, 
sensibly, by little and little, not only all the hard con- 
gruities of grammar, the choice of ablest words, the right 
pronouncing of words and sentences, comeliness of 
figures, and forms fit for every matter and proper for 
every tongue: but, that which is greater also, in marking 
daily and following diligently thus the footsteps of the 
best authors, like invention of arguments, like order in 
disposition, like utterance in elocution, is easily gathered 



ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICH, MILTON. 45 

up ; and hereby your scholar shall be brought not only 
to like eloquence, but also to all true understanding and 
rightful judgment, both for writing and speaking/' 

Again he says: "For speedy attaining, I durst venture 
a good wager if a scholar in whom is aptness, love, 
diligence, and constancy, would but translate after this 
sort some little book in Tully (as 'De Senectute,' with 
two Epistles, the first ^ Ad Quintum Fratrem,' the other 
* Ad Lentulum'), that scholar, I say, should come to a 
better knowledge in the Latin tongue than the most 
part do that spend from five to six years in tossing all 
the rules of grammar in common schools." After quot- 
ing the instance of Dion Prussaeus, who came to great 
learning and utterance by reading and following only 
two books, the *' Phaedo" and **^ Demosthenes de Falsa 
Legatione,'' he goes on: "And a better and nearer ex- 
ample herein may be our most noble Queen Elizabeth, 
who never took yet Greek nor Latin grammar in her 
hand after the first declining of a noun and a verb; but 
only by this double translating of Demosthenes and 
Isocrates daily, without missing, every forenoon, and 
likewise some part of Tully every afternoon, for the 
space of a year or two, hath attained to such a perfect 
understanding in both the tongues, and to such a ready 
utterance of the Latin, and that with such a judgment, 
as there be few now in both Universities or elsewhere in 
England that be in both tongues comparable with Her 
Majesty." Ascham's authority is indeed not conclusive 
on this point, as he, in praising the Queen's attainments, 
was vaunting his own success as a teacher, and, more- 
over, if he flattered her he could plead prevailing cus- 



4^ ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

torn. But we have, I believe, abundant evidence that 
Elizabeth was an accomplished scholar. 

Before I leave Ascham I must make one more quota- 
tion, to which I shall more than once have occasion to 
refer. Speaking of . the plan of double translation, he 
says: "Ere the scholar have construed, parsed, twice 
translated over by good advisement, marked out his six 
points by skillful judgment, he shall have necessary oc- 
casion to read over every lecture a dozen times at the 
least; which because he shall do it always in order, he 
shall do it always with pleasure. ... And pleasure 
allureth love; love hath lust to labor; labor always 
obtaineth his purpose.'^ 

MONTAIGNE. 

Latin should be Taught by Conversation. Montaigne 
was a contemporary of Ascham, but about thirty years 
younger. In his Essays he may be said to have founded 
a school of thinkers on the subject of education, of 
which Locke and Rousseau were afterward the great ex- 
ponents. As far as regards method of teaching lan- 
guages, he simply discarded grammatical teaching and 
wished that all could be taught Latin as he had been, 
i.e., by conversation. His father had found a German 
tutor for him, who spoke Latin but not French; and the 
child thus grew up to consider Latin his mother-tongue. 
At six years old he knew no more French, he tell us, 
than Arabic. 

Education too Linguistic. As I intend giving an ac- 
count of Montaigne^s principles, in the form in which 



ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICH, MILTON. 4/ 

they were presented by Locke and Rousseau, I need not 
state them fully in this place; but a quotation or two will 
ahow how much his successors were indebted to him. 
He complains of common education as being too much 
taken up with language. " Fine speaking," says he, 
"is a very good and commendable quality, but not so 
excellent or so necessary as some would make it ; and 
I am scandalized that our whole life should be spent in 
nothing else. I would first understand my own lan- 
guage, and that of my neighbor, with whom most of my 
business and conversation lies. No doubt Greek and 
Latin are very great ornaments, and of very great use; 
but we may buy them too dear." From our constant 
study of words the world is nothing but babble; and yet 
of the truly educated we must say with Cicero, "' Hane 
amplissimam omnium artium bene vivendi disciplinam, 
vita magis quam Uteris persecuti sunt." (They have 
followed this greatest of all arts, the art of living rightly 
in life rather than in literature. ) He would take for his 
models not the Athenians, but the Spartans. ^' Those 
cudgelled their brains about words, these made it their 
business to inquire into things; there was an eternal 
babble of the tongue, liere a continual exercise of the 
soul. And therefore it is nothing strange if, when 
Antipater demanded of them fifty children for hostages, 
they made answer that they would rather give him twice 
as many full grown men, so much did they value the loss 
•of their country^s education." 

Ordinary Teaching not Productive. Ordinary teaching, 
;again, gives only the thoughts of others, without requir- 
ing the pupil to think for himself. " We suffer ourselves 



4B ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

to lean and rely so very strongly upon the arm of another, 
that by doing so we prejudice our own strength and 
vigor. ... I have no taste for this relative, mendicant, 
and precarious understanding ; for though we should be- 
come learned by other men's reading, I am sure a man 
can never be wise but by his own wisdom." As it is, 
'^ we only toil and labor to stuff the memory, and in the 
meantime leave the conscience and the understanding- 
unfurnished and void. And, like birds who fly abroad 
to forage for grain bring it home in their beak without 
tasting it themselves, to feed their young, so our pedants 
^o picking knowledge here and there out of several 
authors, and hold it at their tongue's end only to spit 
it out and distribute it amongst their pupils." The 
dancing-master might as well attempt to teach us to cut 
capers by our listening to his instructions without mov- 
ing from our seats, as the tutor to inform our under- 
standings without setting them to work. " Yet 't is the 
custom of schoolmasters to be eternally thundering in 
their pupils' ears, as they were pouring into a funnel, 
whilst the pupils' business is only to repeat what the 
others have said before. Now I would have a tutor to 
correct this error, and that at the very first: he should, 
according to the capacity he has to deal with, put it to 
the test, permitting his pupil himself to taste and relish 
things, and of himself to choose and discern them, some- 
times opening the way to him, and sometimes making- 
him break the ice himself; that is, I would not have the 
governor alone to invent and speak, but that he should 
also hear his pupils speak. Socrates, and since him 
Arcesilaus, made first their scholars speak, and then 



ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICH, MILTON. 49 

spoke to them. Ohest j^levicmqiie its qui discere volunt 
auctoritas eorum qui docent" (The authority of those 
who teach stands much in the way of those who learn.) 
(Cic. "DeNat. Deor.") 

He also insisted on the importance of physical educa- 
tion. " We have not to train up a soul, nor yet a body, 
but a man ; and we can not divide him." 

THE INNOVATORS. 

Effect of the Reformation. The Papal system was 
connected, in the minds of the Eeformers, with scho- 
lastic subtilties, monkish Latin, and ignorance of Greek; 
the Reformation itself, with the revival of classical 
learning. Their opponents, the Jesuits, also fostered 
Latin as the language of the Church, and taught Greek 
as necessary for controversy. So, for a time, the effect 
of the Reformation was to confine instruction more 
exclusively to the classical languages. The old Trivium 
(grammar, logic, and rhetoric), and Quadrivium (arith- 
metic, geometry, music, and astronomy), had recognized, 
at least in name, a course of instruction in what was 
then the encyclopaedia of knowledge. But now all the 
great schoolmasters — Ascham in England, Sturm in 
Germany, the Jesuits everywhere — thought of nothing 
but Latin and Greek. Before long, other voices besides 
Montaigne^s were heard objecting to this bondage to 
foreign languages, and demanding more attention for 
the mother-tongue and for the study of things. This 
demand has been kept up by a series of reformers, with 
whom the classicists, after withstanding a siege of nearly 



50 JSSSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

three centuries seem at length inclined to come to 
terms. 

Demands of the Reformers. The chief demands of 
these reformers, or Innovators, as Ranmer calls them, 
have been, 1st, that the study of tilings should precede, 
or be united with, the study of words (v. Appendix, p. 
314); 2d, that knowledge should be communicated, 
v/here possible, by appeals to the senses ; 3d, that all 
linguistic study should begin with that of the mother- 
tongue ; 4 th, that Latin and Greek should be taught to 
such boys only as would be likely to complete a learned 
education ; 5th, that physical education should be at- 
tended to in all classes of society for the sake of health, 
not simply with a view to gentlemanly accomplishments ; 
6th, that a new method of teaching should be adopted, 
framed '' according to nature." 

Summary of the Methods of the Reformers. Their 
notions of method have, of course, been very various ; 
but their systems mostly agree in these particulars : 

1. They proceed from the concrete to the abstract, 
giving some knowledge of the thing itself before the 
rules which refer to it. 2. They employ the student in 
analyzing matter put before him, rather than in working 
synthetically according to precept. 3. They require the 
student to teach himself , under the superintendence of 
the master, rather than be taught by the master and 
receive anything on the master's authority. 4. They 
rely on the interest excited in the pupil by the acquisi- 
tion of knowledge, and renounce coercion. 5. Only that 
which is understood may be committed to memory. 



ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICH, MILTON. 51 



RATICH. 

Ratich's Wonderful Discovery. During the early years 
of the seventeenth century, there ^.s a man traveling" 
over Europe, to offer to Princes and Universities a 
wonderful discovery, whereby old or young might Avith 
ease, in a very short time, learn Hebrew, Greek, Latin, 
or any other tongue. This, however, was but a small 
part of what the discoverer promised. He would also 
found a school, in which all arts and sciences should be 
rapidly learnt and advanced ; he would introduce, and 
peacefully maintain throughout the continent, a uniform 
speech, a uniform government, and, more wonderful 
still, a uniform religion. From these modest proposals, 
we should naturally infer that the promiser was nothing 
but a quack of more than usual impudence ; but the 
position which the name of Ratich holds in the history 
of education is sufficient proof that this is by no means 
a complete account of the matter. 

Biography. Ratich was born at Wilster, in Holstein, 
in 1571. He was educated in the Hamburg Gym- 
nasium, studied theology at Rostock, and being pre- 
vented, by some defect of utterance, from taking Holy 
Orders, he traveled, first to England, and then to Am- 
sterdam, where he elaborated his system, and offered 
his secret to Prince Maurice of Orange. The Prince 
wished to stipulate that he should confine himself to 
teaching Latin ; but Ratich was far too much impressed 
with the importance of his scheme to agree to this. So 
he went about from Court to Court, from University to 



52 jEssavs on educational reformers. 

University^ to find some ruler or learned body who 
would agree to his terms. In 1612 he memorialized th& 
Electoral Diet, then sitting at Frankfort ; and his memo- 
rial attracted so much notice, that several Princes ap- 
pointed learned men to inquire into his system. Helvi- 
cus, one of the most celebrated of these, published ar 
Beport, in which he declared strongly in favor of Eatich.. 
" We are/^ says he, ^^ in bondage to Latin. The Greeks- 
and Saracens would never have done so much for pos- 
terity, if they had spent their youth in acquiring a 
foreign tongue. We must study our own language, and 
then sciences. Eatich has discovered the art of teaching 
according to nature. By his method, languages will be 
quickly learned, so that we shall have time for science ; 
and science will be learned even better still, as the 
natural system suits best with science, which is the 
study of nature." 

Summoned to Augsburg. Influenced by this Eeport^ 
the town of Augsburg in 1614 summoned \>f Eatich ta 
reform their schools. Here the innovator found, to his 
cost, that he who leaves the high road has rough ground 
to travel over, and all kinds of obstacles to surmount. 
Even his best friends, among then Helvicus, were forced 
to admit that they were disappointed with the result of 
the experiment. They did not desert him, however ; and,. 
in 1619, Prince Lewis of Anhalt-Kothen, with Prince 
Ernest of Weimar, resolved that the great discovery 
should not be lost to the world for want of a fair trial : 
so Eatich was established at Kothen, and all his de- 
mands were complied with. A printing-press was set 
up for him, with Eastern as well as European types. 



ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICH, MILTON. 55 

A body of teachers (bound over to secrecy) came to 
receive his instructions, and then carried them out, 
under his directions, in a school of 230 boys and 200 
girls, which the Prince got together for him. But every- 
thing was soon in disorder. Instead of intoducing the 
uniform religion, he offended the Oalvinistic Kotheners 
by his uncompromising Lutheranism. And his success 
was by no means such as to defy hostile criticism. His 
enemies soon declared the whole scheme a failure, and 
naturally went on to denounce its author as an impostor. 
The Prince, exasperated by the utter break-down of his 
expectations, revenged himself on Raticli by throwing 
him into prison, and after a confinement of some months 
dismissed him with a public declaration that he had 
promised what he was unable to perform. 

For more than twenty years after this, Ratich con- 
tinued to trumpet his system ; but in the din ol the 
Thirty Years' War he did not receive much attention. 
He died in 1635. 

Ratich the first to Propound many Important Princi- 
ples. Although Ratich's pretensions were manifestly 
absurd, and his binding over his pupils to secrecy makes 
us suspect him of being a charlatan, he really seems to 
have been the first to propound many of those principles 
which I have mentioned as the common property of the 
Innovators. Although he professed to teach a foreign 
language in six months, he gave extreme prominence to 
the study of the mother-tongue. The children at Kothen 
had to go through three classes before they began any 
other language. His maxims are these : 1. ^^ Everything 
after the order and course of Nature.^' 2. " One thing. 



54 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

at a time/^ 3. "One thing again and again repeated.'^ 
4. '^ Nothing shall be learnt by heart/' In learning by 
heart, he says, the attention is fixed on the words, not 
on the ideas ; but if a thing is thoroughly grasped bj 
the understanding, the memory retains it without further 
trouble. 5. "Uniformity in all things/' Everything 
was to be taught in the same way. Grammars of differ- 
ent languages were to be constructed on the same plan, 
and were to differ only in those parts where the idioms 
of the languages differed.* 6. " Knowledge of the thing 
itself must be given before that which refers to the 
thing." You do not give the properties of the square or 
circle before the pupil knows what square and circle are, 
says Ratich ; why, then, should you give rules about 
patronymics, e. g., before the pupil knows anything of 
patronymics, or, indeed, of the simplest facts of the 
language? The use of rules is to confirm previous 
knowledge, and not to give knowledge. 7. "Everything 
by experiment and analysis.'' Per inductionem et ex- 
perimentum omnia. Nothing was to be received on 
authority. Indeed, Ratich even adopted the motto> 
"Vetustas cessit, ratio vicit" (antiquity has yielded; 
reason has conquered), as if the opposite to ratio was 
vetustas, 8. "Everything without coercion." The 
human understanding, he says, is so formed that it best 
retains what it finds pleasure in receiving. The rod 
should be used to correct offenses against morals only, 

*This suggestion about grammars seems reasonable ; but so^ 
little has it been attended to, that when children learn in this 
country both English and Latin grammar, the very nomenclature 
differs, as if on purpose to bewilder them. 



A sen AM, MONTAIGNE, RATICH, MILTON. 55 

Eatich laid great stress on the maintenance of a good 
feeling between the teacher and the taught, and, lest this 
should be endangered by necessary discipline, he would 
hand over the care of discipline to a separate officer, 
called the Scholarch. 

Ratich's Method of Teaching. When we examine 
Eatich's method of teaching, we shall find that here, too, 
he deserves to be considered the Coryphseus of the Inno- 
vators. The teacher of the lowest class at Kothen had 
to talk with the children, and to take pains with their 
pronunciation. When they knew their letters, the 
teacher read the book of Genesis through to them, each, 
chapter twice over, requiring the children to follow with 
eye and finger. Then the teacher began the chapter 
again, and read about four lines only, which the children 
read after him. When the book had been worked over 
in this way, the children were required to read it through 
without assistance. Heading once secured, the master 
proceeded to grammar. He explained, say, what a sub- 
stantive was, and then showed instances in Genesis, and 
next required the children to point out others. In this 
way gi-ammar was verified throughout from Genesis, and 
the pupils were exercised in declining and conjugating 
words taken from the book. 

When they advanced to the study of Latin, they were 
given a translation of a play of Terence, and worked 
over it several times before they were shown the Latin. 
The master then translated the play to them, each half- 
hour's work twice over. At the next reading, the master 
translated the first half hour, and the boys translated the 
same piece the second. Having thus got through the play. 



56 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

they began again, and only the boys translated. After 
this there was a course of grammar, which was applied to 
the Terence, as the grammar of the mother-tongue had 
been to Genesis. Finally, the pupils were put through a 
course of exercises, in which they had to turn into Latin 
sentences imitated from the Terence, and differing from 
the original only in the number or person used. 

Eaumer gives other particulars, and quotes largely 
from the almost unreadable account of Kromayer, one 
of Eatich's followers, in order that we may have, as he 
says, a notion of the tediousness of the method. No 
doubt any one who has followed me hitherto, will con- 
sider that this point has been brought out already with 
sufficient distinctness. 

Ratich's Method like Ascham's. — When we compare 
Katich^s method with that of Ascham, we find that they 
have much in common. Eatich began the study of a 
language with one book, which he worked over with 
the pupil a great many times. Ascham did the same. 
Each lecture, he says, would, according to his plan, be 
gone over a dozen times at the least. Both construed 
to the pupil, instead of requiring him to make out the 
sense for himself. Both taught grammar, not inde- 
pendently, but in connection with the model book. So 
far as the two methods differed, I have no hesitation in 
pronouncing Ascham's the better. It gave the pupil 
more to do, and contained the very important element, 
writing. By this means there was a chance of the in- 
terest of the pupil surviving the constant repetition ; 
but Eatich's pupils must have been bored to death. 
His plan of making them familiar with the translation 



ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICH, MILTON. 5/ 

£rst, was subsequently advocated by Comenius, and may 
have advantages, but in effect the pupil would be tired of 
the play before he began to translate it. Then Ratich's 
plan of going through and through seems very inferior to 
that of thoroughly mastering one lesson before going on 
to the next. I should say that whatever merit there 
was in Ratich^s plan, lay in its insisting on complete i 
knowledge of a single book, and that this knowledge 
would be much better attained by Ascham^s practice of 
double translation. 

MILTON. 

Most Notable Man who ever kept School. In the 

middle of the seventeenth century there was in Eng- 
land a school-master, and author of a Latin *^ Acci- 
dence,^^ who was perhaps the most notable man who 
ever kept a school or published a school-book. This 
was John Milton. His notions of education have been 
very briefly recorded by him in his Tract to Hartlib, 
and have been read by many of us, not, I fancy, 
without a feeling of disappointment. His proposals, 
indeed, like everything connected with him, are of 
heroic mold. The reader (especially if he be a school- 
master) gasps for breath at the mere enumeration of the 
subjects to be learned and the books to be read. In 
natural philosophy "they (the scholars) may proceed 
leisurely from the history of meteors, minerals, plants, 
and living creatures, as far as anatomy.^' In law, " they 
are to dive into the grounds of law and legal justice, 
delivered first, and with best warrant, by Moses, and, as 
far as human prudence can be trusted, in those extolled 
remains of Grecian lawgivers, Lycurgus, Solon, Zaleu- 



58 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

cus, Charondas, and thence to all the Eoman edicts and 
tables with their Justinian, and so down to Saxon and 
common laws of England and the Statutes/^ '^ To set 
them right and firm in the knowledge of virtue and 
hatred of vice, their young and pliant affections are to 
be led through all the moral works of Plato, Xenophon, 
Cicero, Plutarch, and those Locrian remnants/' *' At 
some set hour they are to learn Hebrew," with the 
Chaldee and Syrian dialects, and " they may have easily 
learned at any odd hour the Italian tongue!" '^ This," 
says Milton (and here at least he carries the reader with 
him), ^' is not a bow for every man to shoot in, that calls 
himself a teacher." 

Milton agrees with the Innovators. But though 
Milton flew so high, we shall find, if we examine his 
proposals, that he took the same direction as the other 
Innovators. (1) He denounced, as they did, ^'^the asinine 
feast of sow-thistles and brambles, to which we now 
haul and drag our choicest and hopefullest wits, as 
all the food and entertainment of their tenderest and 
most docilable age." In the schools he complains that 
nothing but grammar was taught, at the universities 
nothing but logic and metaphysics. He would turn 
from these verbal toils to the study of things. Language 
was not to be studied for itself, but merely as an instru- 
ment conveying to us things useful to be known. Latin 
and Greek must therefore be acquired by a method that 
will take little time. This method he does not describe 
at length, but his words seem to refer to some such plan 
as that of Ascham or Eatich. '^ Whereas," he says, " if 
after some preparatory grounds of speech by their cer- 
tain forms got into memory, they were led to the praxis 



ASCHAM, MONTAIGNE, RATICff, MILTON. 59 

thereof in some cliosen short looh lessoned thoroughly to 
them, they might then forthwith proceed to learn the sub- 
stance of good things and arts in due order, which would 
bring the whole language quickly into their power/' 
(2) The young were to be led on ''^by the infinite desire 
of a happy nurture ; for the hill of knowledge, laborious 
indeed at the first ascent, else is so smooth, so green, so 
full of goodly prospect and melodious sounds on every 
side, that the harp of Orpheus was not more charming." 
"Arithmetic and the elements of geometry might be 
learnt even playing, as the old manner was." (3) So 
averse was Milton to a merely bookish training, that he 
would procure for his pupils "the helpful experiences 
of hunters, fowlers, fishermen, shepherds, gardeners, 
and apothecaries ; and in other sciences, architects, en- 
gineers, mariners, and anatomists." The boys were 
both to hear and be taught music — a commencement of 
aesthetic culture. (4) A thorough physical training was 
to be provided by warlike exercises, both on horse and 
foot, and by wrestling, " wherein Englishmen are wont 
to excel." * 

We see, then, that the great authority of Milton may 
be claimed by the Innovators, and a protest against a 
purely literary education comes with tremendous force 
from the student who sacrificed his sight to his reading, 
the accomplished scholar whose Latin works were known 
throughout Europe, and the author of "Paradise Lost." 

* I have been assisted here by Professor Seeley's remarks in his 
article on Milton's political opinions, Macmillaii's Magazine, Feb- 
ruary, 1868. 



6o ESSAYS OJV EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 



III. 

COMENIUS. 

His Early Years. John Amos Comenius, the son of a 
miller, who belonged to the Moravian Brethren, was 
born at the Moravian village of Comna, in 1592. Of his 
early life we know nothing but what he himself tells us 
in the following passage : ^' Losing both my parents 
wMle I was yet a child, I began, through the neglect of 
my guardians, but at sixteen years of age, to taste of the 
Latin tongue. Yet, by the goodness of God, that taste 
bred such a thirst in me that I ceased not from that 
time, by all means and endeavors, to labor for the repair- 
ing of my lost years ; and now not only for myself, but 
for the good of others also. For I could not but pity 
others also in this respect, especially in my own nation, 
which is too slothful and careless in the matter of learn- 
ing. Thereupon, I was continually full of thoughts for 
the finding out of some means whereby more might be 
inflamed with the love of learning, and whereby learn- 
ing itself might be made more compendious, both in 
matter of the charge and cost, and of the labor belonging 
thereto, that so the youth might be brought by a more 
easy method unto some notable proficiency in learning. ^^* 
With these thoughts in his head, he pursued his studies 
in several German towns, especially at Herborn in Nas- 

* Preface to the Prodromus, 



COM EN I us. 01 



sau. Here he saw the Eeport on Ratich's method, pub- 
lished in 1612 for the Universities of Jena and Giessen ; 
and we find him shortly afterward writing his first book, 
'' GrammaticaB facilioris Praecepta/^ which was pub- 
lished at Prag in 1616. 

Settled at Fulneck. On his return to Moravia, he was 
appointed to the Brethren's school at Prerau, but (to 
use his own words) *'^ being shortly after, at the age of 
twenty-four, called to the service of the Church, because 
that divine function challenged all my endeavors, these 
scholastic cares were laid aside." His pastoral charge 
was at Fulneck, the headquarters of the Brethren. As 
such, it soon felt the effects of the Battle of Prag, being 
in the following year (1621) taken and plundered by the 
Spaniards. On this occasion, Comenius lost almost 
everything he possessed. The year after his wife died, 
and then his only child. In 1624, all Protestant minis- 
ters were banished, and, in 1627, a new decree extended 
the banishment to Protestants of every description. 
Comenius bore up against wave after wave of calamity 
with Christian courage and resignation, and his writings 
at this period were of great value to his fellow-sufferers. 

His Banishment. For a time he found a hiding-place 
in the family of a Bohemian nobleman. Baron Sadowsky, 
at Sloupna, in the Bohemian mountains, and in this 



retirement his attention was again directed to the sci- 
ence of teaching. The Baron had engaged Stadius, one 
of the proscribed, to educate his three sons, and, at 
Stadius' request, Comenius wrote "some canons of a 
better method," for his use. We find him, too, endeav- 
oring to enrich the literature of his mother tongue. 



62 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

making a metrical translation of the Psalms of David, 
and even writing imitations of Virgil^ Ovid, and Oato's 
Disticlis. 

In 1627, however, the persecution waxed so hot that 
Comenius, with most of the Brethren, had to flee their 
country, never to return. On crossing the border, Co- 
menius and the exiles who accompanied him knelt down 
and prayed that God would not suffer His truth to fail 
out of their native land. 

Many of the banished, and Comenius among them, 
settled at the Polish town of Leszno, or, as the Germans 
call it, Lissa, near the Silesian frontier. Here there 
was an old established school of the Brethren, in which 
Comenius found employment. Once more engaged in 
education, he earnestly set about improving the tradi- 
tional methods. As he himself says,* ^' Being, by God^s 
permission, banished my country, with divers others, 
and forced, for my sustenance, to apply myself to the 
instruction of youth, I gave my mind to the perusal of 
divers authors, and lighted upon many which in this 
age have made a beginning in reforming the method of 
studies, as Ratichius, Helvicus, Rhenius, Ritterus, Glau- 
mius, Cascilius, and who indeed should have had the first 
place, Joannes Valentinus Andrae, a man of a nimble and 
clear brain ; as also Campanella and the Lord Verulam, 
those famous restorers of philosophy : — by reading of 
whom I was raised in good hope that at last those so many 
various sparks would conspire into a flame ; yet observing 
here and there some defects and gaps as it were, I could 

* Preface to the Prodromus. 



COMENIUS. 63 



not contain myself from attempting something that 
might rest upon an immovable foundation, and which, if 
it could be once found out, should not be subject to any 
ruin. Therefore, after many workings and tossings of 
my thoughts, by reducing everything to the immovable 
laws of nature, I lighted upon my Didactica Magna, 
which shows the art of readily and solidly teaching all 
men all things/^ 

Writes the Janua. This work did not immediately 
see the light, but in 1631, Comenius published a book 
which made him and the little Polish town where he 
lived known throughout Europe and beyond it. This 
was the Janua Lingnarum Reserata, or " Gate of 
Tongues Unlocked." Writing about it many years af- 
terward he says that he never could have imagined that 
that little work, fitted only for children {puerile istud 
opusciilum), would have been received with applause by 
all the learned world. Letters of congratulation came 
to him from every quarter; and the work was translated 
not only into Greek, Bohemian, Polish, Swedish, Bel- 
gian, English, French, Spanish, Italian, Hungarian, but 
also into Turkish, Arabic, Persian, and even " Mogolic, 
which is familiar to all the East Indies." (Dedication 
of Schola Lucius in Vol. I. of collected works.) 

Plans a Scheme of Universal Knowledge ; Seeks a Pa- 
tron. Incited by the applause of the learned, Comenius 
now planned a scheme of universal knowledge, to impart 
which a series of works would have to be written, far ex- 
ceeding what the resources and industry of one man, 
however great a scholar, could produce. He therefore 
looked about for a patron to supply money for his sup- 



64 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

port, and that of his assistants, whilst these works were 
in progress. ''The vastness of the labors I contem- 
plate/' he writes to a Polish nobleman, ''demands that 
I should have a wealthy patron, whether we look at 
their extent, or at the necessity of securing assistants, or 
at the expenses generally/' 

Comenius in London. At Leszno there seemed no pros- 
pect of his obtaining the aid he required ; but his fame 
now procured him invitations from distant countries. 
First he received a call to improve the schools of Swe- 
den. After declining this, he was induced by his En- 
glish friends to undertake a journey to London, where 
Parliament had shown its interest in the matter of educa- 
tion, and had employed Hartlib, an enthusiastic admirer 
of Comenius, to attempt some reforms. Hartlib pro- 
cured an order summoning Comenius, who gives the fol- 
lowing account of his journey: — 

" When seriously proposing to abandon the thorny 
studies of Didactics, and pass on to the pleasing studies 
of philosophical truth, I find myself again among the 
same thorns. . . . After the Pansoijliim Prodromus had 
been published and dispersed through various kingdoms 
of Europe, many of the learned approved of the object 
and plan of the work, but despaired of its ever being ac- 
complished by one man alone, and therefore advised that 
a college of learned men should be instituted to carry it 
into effect. Mr. S. Hartlib, who had forwarded the 
publication of the ranso])lii(B Prodromus in England, 
labored earnestly in this matter, and endeavored, by 
every possible means, to bring together for this purpose 
a number of men of intellectual activity. And at 



COMENIUS. 65 



length, having found one or two, he invited. me also, 
with many very strong entreaties. As my friends con- 
sented to my departure, I proceeded to London, and ar- 
rived there on the day of the autumnal equinox, 1641, 
and I then learned that I had been called thither by an 
order of Parliament. But in consequence of the King's 
having gone to Scotland, the Parliament had been dis- 
missed for three months, and consequently 1 had to 
winter in London, my friends in the meantime examin- 
ing the ' Apparatus Philosophicus,' small though it was 
at that time. ... At length Parliament having assem- 
bled, and my presence being known, I was commanded 
to wait until after some important business having been 
transacted, a Commission should be issued to certain 
wise and learned men, from amongst themselves, to hear 
me, and be informed of my plan. As an earnest, more- 
over, of their intentions, they communicated to me their 
purpose to assign to us a college with revenues, whence 
some men of learning and industry, selected from any 
nation, might be honorably sustained, either for a cer- 
tain number of years, or in perpetuity. The Savoy in 
London, and beyond London, Winchester, and again 
near the city, Chelsea, were severally mentioned, and in- 
ventories of the latter, and of its revenues, were com- 
municated to me. So that nothing seemed more certain 
than that the design of the great Verulam to open a 
Universal College of all nations, devoted solely to the 
advancement of the sciences was now in the way of be- 
ing carried into effect. But a rumor that Ireland was 
in a state of commotion, and that more than 200,000 of 
the English there had been slaughtered in one night. 



66 ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

the sudden departure of the King from London, and the 
clear indications that a most cruel war was on the point 
of breaking out, threw all these plans into confusion, 
Bnd compelled me and my friends to hasten our return." 

Invited to France. While Comenius was in England, 
where he stayed till August, 1642, he received an invi- 
tation to France. This invitation, which he did not ac- 
cept, came perhaps through his correspondent Mersenne, 
a man of great learning, who is said to have been highly 
esteemed and often consulted by Descartes. It is char- 
acteristic of the state of opinion in such matters in those 
days, that Mersenne tells Comenius of a certain Le Maire, 
by whose method a boy of six year3 old, might, with 
nine months' instruction, acquire a perfect knowledge 
of three languages. Mersenne also had dreams of a uni- 
versal alphabet, and even of a universal language. 

Finds a Patron in De Geer. Comenius' hopes of as- 
sistance in England being at an end, he thought of re- 
turning to Leszno, but a letter now reached him from a 
rich Dutch merchant, Lewis de Geer, who offered him a 
home and means for carrying out his plans. This Lewis 
de Geer, '^the Grand Almoner of Europe," as Comenius 
calls him, displayed a princely munificence in the assist- 
ance he gave the exiled Protestants. At this time he 
was living at Nordcoping in Sweden. Comenius having 
now found such a patron as he was seeking, set out 
from England and joined him there. 

Interviews with Oxenstiern. Soon after the arrival 
of Comenius in Sweden, the great Oxenstiern sent for 
him to Stockholm, and with John Skyte, the Chancellor 
of Upsal University, examined him in several inter- 



COMENIUS. ^7 



views about his system. "From my early youth," said 
Oxenstiern, " I observed something forced and incohe- 
rent in the method of instruction commonly used, but 
could not discover where the impediment lay. At length, 
being sent by my King, of glorious memory, as a legate 
to Germany, I held conferences there on the subject 
with various learned men, and when I was informed that 
Katich had attempted an amendment of the method, I 
could not rest till I had had a personal interview with 
him; when, instead of favoring me with a conference, he 
presented me with a large quarto volume. I went 
through the task imposed upon me, and then perceived 
that he had succeeded in discovering the diseases of the 
schools, but the remedies he suggested seemed very in- 
sufficient. Your remedies rest upon a surer foundation." 
Comenius said it was his wish to get beyond the teaching 
of boys to a great philosophical, or rather '' pansophical " 
work. But both Oxenstiern and Skyte urged him to 
confine himself, for the present, to a task less ambitious, 
but more practically useful. "My counsel," said Oxen- 
stiern, " is that you first satisfy the wants of the schools 
by rendering a knowledge of the Latin language of 
easier acquisition, and thereby preparing the path of a 
readier approach toward those more sublime studies." 
As De Geer gave the same advice, Comenius felt himself 
constrained to follow it, so he agreed to settle at Elbing 
in Prussia, and there write a work on teaching, in which 
the principles of the "Didactica Magna" should be 
worked out with especial reference to teaching languages. 
Notwithstanding the remonstrances of his English 
friends, to which Comenius would gladly have listened. 



68 ESSAYS OJV EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

he was kept by Oxenstiern and De Geer strictly to his 
agreement, and thus, much against his will, he was held 
fast for eight years in what he calls the " miry entangle- 
ments of logomachy/^ 

Comenius settles at Elbing. Elbing, where, aiter a 
journey to Leszno to fetch his family (for he had married 
again), Comenius now settled, is in West Prussia, 36 miles 
southeast of Dantzic. From 1577 to 1660, an English 
trading company was settled here with which the family 
of Hartlib is said in one account to have been connected. 
This perhaps is one reason why Comenius chose this 
town for his residence. But Hartlib, instead of assisting 
with money, seems at this time to have needed assistance, 
for in October, 1642, Comenius writes to De Geer that he 
fears Fundanius and Hartlib are suffering from want, 
and that he intends for them 200Z. promised by the Lon- 
don booksellers : he suggests that De Geer shall give 
them 30/. each meanwhile. 

Pecuniary Difficulties. The relation between Com_e- 
nius and his patron naturally proved a difficult one. The 
Dutchman thought that as he supported Comenius, and 
contributed something more for the assistants, he might 
expect of Comenius that he would devote all his time to 
the scholastic treatise he had undertaken. Comenius, 
however, was a man of immense energy and of widely ex- 
tended sympathies and connections. He was a *' bishop^' 
of the religious body to which he belonged, and in this 
capacity he engaged in controversy, and attended some 
religious conferences. Then, again, pupils were pressed 
upon him, and as money to pay five writers whom he 
kept at work was always running short, he did not de- 



COMENIUS. 69 



cline them. De Geer complained of this, and supplies 
were not furnished with wonted regularity. In 1647 Co- 
menius writes to Hartlib that he is almost overwhelmed 
with cares, and sick to death of writing begging-letters. 
Yet in this year he found means to publish a book ^^ On 
the Causes of this (i.e., the Thirty Years^) War," in 
which the Roman Catholics are attacked with great bit- 
terness — a bitterness for which the position of the writer 
affords too good an excuse. 

The year 1648 brought with it the downfall of all Co- 
menius' hopes of returning to his native land. The 
Peace of Westphalia was concluded without any provis- 
ion being made for the restoration of the exiles. But 
though thus doomed to pass the remaining years of his 
life in banishment, Comenius, in this year, seemed to 
have found an escape from all his pecuniary difficulties. 
The senior bishop, the head of the Moravian Brethren, 
died, and Comenius was chosen to succeed him. In con- 
sequence of this, Comenius returned to Leszno, where 
due provision was made for him by the Brethren. Before 
he left Elbing, however, the fruit of his residence there, 
the " Methodus Linguarum Novissima" (The Newest 
Language Method), had been submitted to a commission 
of learned Swedes, and approved of by them. The MS. 
went with him to Leszno, where it was published. 

Goes into Transylvania : Writes the Orbis Pictus. As 
head of the Moravian Church, there now devolved upon 
Comenius the care of all the exiles, and his wide-spread 
reputation enabled him to get situations for many of 
them in all Protestant countries. Indeed, he was now 
so much connected with the science of education, that 



70 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

even his post at Leszno did no prevent his receiving 
and accepting a call to reform the schools in Transylva- 
nia. A model school was formed at Saros-Patak, in 
which Comenius labored from 1650 till 1654. At this 
time he wrote his most celebrated book, which is indeed 
only an abridgment of his " Janua^' with the important 
addition of pictures, and sent it to ISTiirnberg, where it 
appeared three years later (1657). This was the famous 
" Orbis Pictus." 

Returns to Leszno. Full of trouble as Comenius' life 
had hitherto been, its greatest calamity was still before 
him. After he was again settled at Leszno, Poland was 
invaded by the Swedes, on which occasion the sympathies- 
of the Brethren were with their fellow- Protestants, and 
Comenius was imprudent enough to write a congratula- 
tory address to the Swedish King. A peace followed, by 
the terms of which, several towns, and Leszno among 
them, were made over to Sweden, but when the King 
withdrew, the Poles took up arms again, and Leszno, the 
headquarters of the Protestants, the town in which the 
chief of the Moravian Brethren had written his address 
welcoming the enemy, was taken and plundered. 

Leszno Pillaged. Comenius and his family escaped, 
but his house was marked for special violence, and noth- 
ing was preserved. His sole remaining possessions were 
the clothes in which he and his family traveled. All 
his books and manuscripts were burnt, among them his 
valued work on Pansophia, and a Latin-Bohemian and 
Bohemian-Latin Dictionary, giving words, phrases,, 
idioms, adages, and aphorisms — a book on which he had 



COMENIUS. 71 



been laboring for forty years. ^^Tliis loss," he writes, 
'' I shall cease to lament only when I cease to breathe." 

Returns to Amsterdam ; His last years. After wander- 
ing for some time about Germany, and being prostrated 
by fever at Hamburg, he at length came to Amsterdam, 
where Lawrence De Geer, the son of his deceased patron, 
gave him an asylum. Here were spent the remainino- 
years of his life in ease and dignity. Compassion for 
his misfortune was united with veneration for his learn- 
ing and piety. He earned a sufficient income by giving 
instruction in the families of the wealthy, and by the 
liberality of De Geer he was enabled to publish a fine 
folio edition of all his writings on Education (1657). 
His political works, however, were to the last a source 
of^trouble to him. His hostility to the Pope and the 
House of Hapsburg made him the dupe of certain 
*' prophets" whose soothsayings he published as ^^Lux 
in Tenebris." One of these prophets, who had announced 
that the Turk was to take Vienna, was executed at 
Pressburg, and the " Lux in Tenebris " at the same time 
burnt by the hangman. Before the news of this disgrace 
reached Amsterdam, Comenius was no more. He died 
in the year 1671, at the advanced age of eighty, and 
with him terminated the office of Chief Bishop among 
the Moravian Brethren. 

Comenius both a Philosopher and a School-master. Be- 
fore Comenius, no one had brought the mind of a phi- 
losopher to bear practically on the subject of education. 
Montaigne, Bacon, Milton, had advanced principles, 
leaving others to see to their application. A few able 
school-masters, as Ascham and Ratich, had investigated 



72 ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

new methods, but had made success in teaching the test 
to which they appealed, rather than any abstract prin- 
ciple. Coraenius was at once a philosopher who had 
learnt of Bacon, and a school-master who had earned his 
livelihood by teaching the rudiments. Dissatisfied with 
the state of education as he found it, he sought for a 
better system by an examination of the laws of Nature. 
Whatever is thus established, we must allow to be on an 
immovable foundation, and, as Oomenius himself says, 
'^ not liable to any ruin ; " but looking back on the fruit 
of Comenius' labors, we find that much which he thought 
thus based, was not so in reality — that he often believed 
he was appealing to Nature, when in truth he was merely 
using fanciful illustrations from her. But whatever 
mistakes he and others may have made in consulting the 
oracle, it is no proof of wisdom to attempt, as ^'practical 
men" often do, to use these mistakes in disparagement 
of the oracle itself ; and because some have gone wrong 
when they thought they were following Nature, to treat 
every appeal to her with contempt. It will hardly be 
disputed, when broadly stated, that there are laws of 
Nature which must be obeyed in dealing with the mind, 
as with the body. No doubt these laws are not so easily 
established in the first case as in the second, but who- 
ever in any way assists or even tries to assist in the dis- 
covery, deserves our gratitude, and greatly are we in- 
debted to him who first boldly set about the task^ and 
devoted to it years of patient labor. 

Comenius' Principles. Every one who has studied 
Comenius' voluminous writings is agreed that the " Di- 
dactica Magna," though one of his earlier works, contains. 



COMENIUS 73 



in the best form, the principles he afterward endeavored 
to work out in the '^ Janua," '■'■ Orbis Pictns/' and "No- 
yissima Methodus/^ A short account of this book will 
give some notion of what Oomenius did for education. 

Summary of the Didactica Magna. We iive, says Oome- 
nius, a threefold life — a vegetative, an animal, and an 
intellectual or spiritual. Of these, the first is perfect in 
the womb, the last in heaven. He is happy who comes 
with healthy body into the world, much more he who 
goes with healthy spirit out of it. According to the 
heavenly idea, man should (1) know all things ; (2) 
should be master of all things, and of himself ; (3) 
should refer everything to God. So that within us 
Nature has implanted the seeds of (1) learning, (2) virtue, 
(3) piety. To bring these to maturity is the object of 
education. All men require education, and God has 
made children unfit for other employments that they 
may have leisure to learn. 

But schools have failed, and instead of keeping to the 
true object of education, and teaching the foundations, 
relations, and intentions of all the most important things, 
they have neglected even the mother-tongue, and con- 
fined the teaching to Latin, and yet that has been so 
badly taught, and so much time has been wasted over 
grammar rules and dictionaries, that from ten to twenty 
years are spent in acquiring as much knowledge of Latin 
as is speedily acquired of any modern tongue. 

Education must follow Nature. The cause of this want 
of success is that the system does not follow Nature. 
Everything natural goes smoothly and easily. There 
must, therefore, be no pressure. Learning should come 



74 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

to children as swimming to fish, flying to birds, running 
to animals. As Aristotle says, the desire of knowledge 
is implanted in man : and the mind grows as the body 
does — by taking proper nourishment, not by being 
stretched on the rack. 

If we would ascertain how teaching and learning are 
to have good results, we must look to the known proc- 
esses of Nature and Art. A man sows seed, and it 
comes up he knows not how, but in sowing it he must 
attend to the requirements of Nature. Let us then look 
to Nature to find out how instruction is to be sown in 
young minds. We find that Nature waits for the fit 
time. Then, too, she has prepared the material before 
she gives it form. In our teaching we constantly run 
counter to these principles of hers. We give instruction 
before the young minds are ready to receive it. We 
give the form before the material. Words are taught 
before the things to which they refer. When a foreign 
tongue is to be taught, we commonly give the form, i.e., 
the grammatical rules, before we give the material, 
i.e., the language, to which the rules apply. We 
should begin with an author, or properly prepared trans- 
lation-book, and abstract rules should never come before 
the examples. 

Everything to be taught first in Rudimentary Outline. 
Again, Nature begins each of her works with its inmost 
part. Moreover, the crude form comes first, then the 
elaboration of the parts. The architect, acting on this 
principle, first makes a rough plan or model, and then 
by degrees designs the details ; last of all he attends to 
the ornamentation. In teaching, then, let the inmost 



COM EN I us. 75 



part, i.e., the understanding of the subject, come first, 
then let the thing understood be used to exercise the 
memory, the speech, and the hands; and let every lan- 
guage, science, and art be taught first in its rudimentary 
outline; then more completely with examples ?sA rules ; 
finally, with exceptions and anomalies. Instead of this, 
some teachers are foolish enough to require beginners to j j 
get up all the anomalies in Latin grammar, and the dia- '' 
lects in Greek. 

Nothing by Fits and Starts. Again, as Nature does 
nothing yer scdtum, nor halts when she has begun, the 
whole course of studies should be arranged in strict or- 
der, so that the earlier studies prepare the way for the 
latter. Every year, every month, every day and hour 
even, should have its task marked out beforehand, and 
the plan should be rigidly carried out. Much loss is 
occasioned by absence of boys from school, and by 
changes in the instruction. Iron that might be wrought 
with one heating should not be allowed to get cold, and 
be heated over and over again. 

Nature protects her work from injurious influences, 
so boys should be kept from injurious companionships 
and books. 

Principles of Easy Teaching. In a chapter devoted 
to the principles of easy teaching, Comenius lays down, 
among rules similar to the foregoing, that children will j 
learn if they are taught only what they have a desire to | 
learn, with due regard to their age and the method of 
instruction, and especially when everything is first 
taught by means of the senses. On this point Comenius 
laid great stress, and he was, I believe, the first who did 



'j6 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 



SO. Education should proceed, he said, in the following 
order : first, educate the senses, then the memory, then 
the intellect ; last of all, the critical faculty. This is 
the order of Nature. The child first perceives through 
the senses. Niliil est in inteUectu quod non prius 171 
sensii. (Nothing is in the mind except that which was 
before in sense.) These perceptions are stored in the 
memory, and called up by the imagination. By com- 
paring one with another, the understanding forms gen- 
eral ideas, and at length the judgment decides between 
the false and the true. By keeping to this order, Co- 
menius believed it would be possible to make learning 
entirely pleasant to the pupils, however young. Here 
Oomenius agreed with the Jesuits, and in part he would 
use the same means to make the road to learning agree-, 
able. Like them, he would have short school-hours, 
and would make great use of praise and blame, but he 
did not depend, as they did, almost exclusively on emu- 
lation. 

Besire of Learning to be Fostered. He would have 
the desire of learning fostered in every possible way — by 
parents, by teachers, by school buildings and apparatus, 
by the subjects themselves, by the method of teaching 
them, and lastly, by the public authorities. (1) The 
/ parents must praise learning and learned men, must 
\ show children beautiful books, etc., must treat the 
teachers with great respect. (2) The teacher must be 
kind and fatherly, he must distribute praise and reward, 
and must always, where it is possible, give the children 
something to look at. (3) The school buildings must 
be light, airy, and cheerful, and well furnished with ap- 



COMENIUS. 77 



paratus, as pictures, maps, models, collections of speci- 
mens. (4) The subjects taught must not be too hard 
for the learner's comprehension, and the more enter- 
taining parts of them must be especially dwelt upon. 
(5) The method must be natural, and everything that is 
not essential to the subject or is beyond the pupil must 
be omitted. Fables and allegories should be introduced, 
and enigmas given for the pupils to guess. (6) The 
authorities must appoint public examinations and re- 
ward merit. 

Nature helps herself in various ways, so the pupils 
should have every assistance given them. It should es- 
pecially be made clear what the pupils are to learn, and 
how they should learn it. 

The pupils should be punished for offenses against l| 
morals only. If they do not learn, the fault is with the 
teacher. 

Things as well as Words. One of Comenius' most 
distinctive principles was, that the knowledge of things 
should be communicated together ivitli the hno2oledge of 
words. This, together with his desire of submitting 
everything to the pupil's senses, would have introduced 
a great change into the course of instruction, which was 
then, as it has for the most part continued, purely lit- 
erary. We should learn, says Comenius, as much as 
possible, not from books, but from the great book of 
Nature, from heaven and earth, from oaks and beeches. 

Languages to be Learned Separately. When lan- 
guages are to be learnt, he would have them taught 
separately. Till the pupil is from eight to ten years 
old, he should be instructed only in the mother-tongue, 



78 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

and about things. Then other languages can be ac- 
quired in about a year each; Latin (which is to be stud- 
ied more thoroughly) in about two years. Every lan- 
guage must be learnt by use rather than by rules ; i.e., 
it must be learnt by hearing, reading, and re-reading, 
transcribing, attempting imitations in writing, and ver- 
bally, and by using the language in conversation. Kules 
assist and confirm practice, but they must come after, 
not before it. The first exercises in a language should 
take for their subject something of which the sense is 
already known, so that the mind may be fixed on the 
words and their connections.* The Catechism and 
Bible History may be used for this purpose. 

Classical Authors not Suited to Boys. Considering 
the classical authors not suited to boys' understanding, 
and not fit for the education of Christians, Comenius 
proposed writing a set of Latin manuals for the different 
stages between childhood and manhood : these were to 
be called, "Vestibulum," ^^Janua,'' "Palatium," "The- 
saurus,'^ The " Vestibulum" and " Janua" were really 
carried out. 

Four Kinds of Schools. In Comenius' scheme there 
were to be four kinds of schools for a perfect educational 
course : 1st, the mother's breast for infancy ; 2d, the 
public vernacular school for children, to which all should 
be sent from six years old till twelve ; 3d, the Latin 
school or Gymnasium ; 4th, residence at a University 
and traveling, to complete the course. 

* Comenius here follows Raticb,who, as I have mentioned above 
(p. 55), required beginners to study the translation before the origi- 
nal. 



CO MEN I us. 79 



The Elementary School ; Course of Study. As the 
Ludus Uterarius seu schola vernacula (vernacular 
school) was a very distinctive feature in Comenius' plan, 
it may be worth while to give his programme of studies. 
In this school the children should learn — 1st, to read 
and write the mother-tongue loell, both with writing and 
printing letters ; 2d, to compose grammatically ; 3d, to 
cipher; 4th, to measure and weigh ; 5th, to sing, at first 
popular airs, then from music ; 6th, to say by heart 
sacred psalms and hymns ; 7th, Catechism, Bible His- 
tory, and texts ; 8th, moral rules, with examples ; 9th, 
economy and politics, as far as they could be under- 
stood ; 10th, general history of the world ; 11th, figure 
of the earth and motion of stars, etc., physics and 
geography, especially of native land ; 12 th, general 
knowledge of arts and handicrafts. 

Each school was to be divided into six classes, corre- 
sponding to the six years the pupil should spend in it. 
The hours of work were to be, in school, two hours in 
the morning and two in the afternoon, with nearly the 
same amount of private study. In the morning the 
mind and memory were to be exercised, in the afternoon 
the hands and voice. Each class was to have its proper 
lesson-book written expressly for it, so as to contain 
everything that class had to learn. When a lesson was 
to be got by heart from the book, the teacher was first to 
read it to the class, explain it, and re-read it ; the boys 
then to read it aloud by turns till one of them offered to 
repeat it without book ; the others were to do the same 
as soon as they were able, till all had repeated it. This 
lesson was then to be worked over again as a writing 



8o ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

lesson, etc. In the higher forms of the vernacular school 
a modern language was to be taught and duly practiced. 

General Character of Comenius' Reforms. From this 
specimen of the ^^Didactica Magna" the reader will see 
the kind of reforms at which Comenius aimed. Before 
his time the Jesuits alone had had a complete educational 
course planned out, and had pursued a uniform method 
in carrying this plan through. They, too^ already were 
distinguished for their endeavors to make learning pleas- 
ant to their pupils, to lead, not drive them. But Come- 
nius, advancing so far with the Jesuits, entirely differed 
from them as to the subjects to be taught. The Jesuits 
was as purely a literary training as that in our public 
schools. Comenius was among the first who laid stress 
on the teaching about things, and called in the senses to 
do their part in the work of early education. Thus he 
was the forerunner of Pestalozzi, and of the champions 
of science as Tyndall and H. Spencer among ourselves. 

Gate of Languages Unlocked. It was not his princi- 
ples, however, that first attracted the notice of Comenius* 
contemporaries, but his book, ^^ Janua Linguarum Re- 
serata," in which, with very imperfect success, he endeav- 
ored to carry out those principles. 

For the idea of the work Comenius was beholden to a 
Jesuit, as he candidly confesses. It seems that one 
Batty, a Jesuit of Irish birth, engaged in the Jesuit 
college of Salamanca, had endeavored to construct a 
"Noah's Ark for words ;" i.e., a work treating shortly 
of all kinds of subjects, in such a way as to introduce in 
a natural connection every word in the Latin language. 
*'The idea," says Comenius, "was better than the exe- 



COMENIUS. 



cution. Nevertheless, inasmuch as they (the Jesuits) 
were the prime inventors, we thankfully acknowledge it, 
nor will we upbraid them with those errors they have 
committed." The plan commended itself to Comenius 
on various grounds. First, he had a notion of giving an 
outline of all knowledge before anything was taught in 
detail. Next, he could by such a book connect the 
teaching about simple things with instruction in the 
Latin words which applied to them. And thirdly, he 
hoped by this means to give such a complete Latin 
vocabulary as to render the use of Latin easy for all re- 
quirements of modern society. He accordingly wrote a 
short account of things in general, which he put in the 
form of a dialogue, and this he published in Latin and 
German at Leszno about 1531. The success of this 
work, as we have already seen, was prodigious. No 
doubt the spirit which animated Bacon was largely dif- 
fused among educated men in all countries, and they 
hailed the appearance of a book which called the youth 
from the study of old philosophical ideas to observe the 
facts around them. 

" The Janua" in English. The countrymen of Bacon 
were not backward in adopting the new work, as the 
following, from the title-page of a volume in the British 
Museum, will show: ^' The Gate of Tongues Unlocked 
and Opened ; or else, a Seminary or Seed-plot of all 
Tongues and Sciences. That is, a short way of teaching 
and thoroughly learning, within a year and a half at the 
furthest, the Latin, English, French, and any other 
tongue, with the ground and foundation of arts and 
sciences, comprised under a hundred titles and 1058 



82 £SSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

periods. In Latin first, and now, as a token of thank- 
fulness, brought to light in Latin, English, and French, 
in the behalf of the most illustrious Prince Charles, and 
of British, French, and Irish youth. The 4th edition, 
much enlarged, by the labor and industry of John 
Anchoran, Licentiate in Divinity, London. Printed by 
Edward Griffin for Michael Sparke, dwelling at the Blew 
Bible in Green Arbor, 1639." 

Objections to Grammatical Learning. In the preface 
to this volume we have the complaint which has repro- 
duced itself in various forms up to the present time, 
that the "youth was delayed with grammar precepts 
infinitely tedious, perplexed, obscure, and (for the most 
part) unprofitable, and that for many years." From this 
barren region the pupil was to escape to become ac- 
quainted with things. " Come on," says the teacher in 
the opening dialogue ; "let us go forth into the open air. 
There you shall view whatsoever God produced from the 
beginning, and doth yet affect by nature. Afterward we 
will go into towns, shops, schools, where you shall 
see how men do both apply those Divine works to their 
nses, and also instruct themselves in arts, manners, 
tongues. Then we will enter into houses, courts, and 
palaces of princes, to see in what manner communities 
of men are governed. At last we will visit temples, 
where you shall observe how diversely mortals seek 
to worship their Creator and to be spiritually united 
unto Him, and how He by His Almightiness disposeth 
all things." (This isfrom the 1656 edition, by " W.D.") 

The book is still amusing, but only from the quaint 



COMENIUS. 



manner in which the mode of life two hundred years 
ago is described. 

Character of the "Janua Linguarum." But though 
parts of the book may on first reading have gratified the 
youth of the seventeenth century, a great deal of it 
gave scanty information about difficult subjects, such as 
physiology, geometry, logic, rhetoric, and that, too, in 
the driest and dullest way. Moreover, Comenius boasts 
that no important word occurs twice ; so that the book, 
to attain the end of giving a perfect stock of Latin 
words, would have to be read and re-read till it was al- 
most known by heart; and however amusing boys might 
find an account of their toys written in Latin the first 
time of reading, the interest would somewhat wear away 
by the fifth or sixth time. We can not then feel much 
surprised on reading this "general verdict," written 
some thirty years later, touching those earlier works of 
Comenius : " They are of singular use, and very advan- 
tageous to those of more discretion (especially to such as 
have already got a smattering in Latin), to help their 
memories to retain what they have scatteringly gotten 
here and there, and to furnish them with many words 
which perhaps they had not formerly read or so well ob- 
served ; but to young children, as those that are ignorant 
altogether of most things and words, they prove rather 
a mere toil and burden than a delight and further- 
ance."* 

" Orbis Pictus." The " Janua" would, therefore, have 

* Hoole's preface to his trans, of Orbis Pictus. 



84 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

had but a short-lived popularity with teachers, aud a 
still shorter with learners, if Comenius had not carried 
out his principle of appealing to the senses, and called 
in the artist. The result was the ^''Orbis Pictus," a, 
book which proved a favorite with young and old, and 
maintained its ground in many a school for more than a 
century. The " Orbis " was, in substance, the same as 
the " Janua," though abbreviated, but it had this dis- 
tinctive feature, that each subject was illustrated by a 
small engraving, in which everything named in the let- 
ter-press below was marked with a number, and its name- 
was found connected with the same number in the text.. 
I am sorry I can not give a specimen of this celebrated 
book with its quaint pictures. The artist, of course,, 
was wanting in the technical skill which is now commonly 
displayed even in very cheap publications, but this ren- 
ders his delineations none the less entertaining. As a. 
picture of the life and manners of the seventeenth cen- 
tury, the work has great historical interest, which will,., 
I hope, secure for it another English edition; especially 
as the last (that of 1777, reprinted in America in 1812), 
which is now occasionally to be met with, is far inferior to^ 
those of an earlier date. 

Relation of Milton to Comenius. In the beginning of 
the tract to Hartlib, Milton would seem to deny that he 
had learned anything from Comenius. Whether this is 
his meaning or not, he gives expression in the tract to- 
the principle of which Comenius was the great exponent. 
" Because one's understanding can not, in this body, 
found itself but on sensible things, nor arrive so clearly 



LOCKE. 85 



to the knowledge of God and things invisible as by 
orderly conning over the visible and inferior creature, 
the same method is necessarily to be followed in all dis- 
■creet teaching." This conviction, which bore fruit in 
the Baconian philosphy, was systematically brought to 
bear by Comenius on the instruction of youth. 



IV. 

LOCKE. 



Locke and Hamilton. Among the writers on education 
and inventors of new methods, there are only two En- 
glishmen who have a European celebrity — Locke and 
Hamilton. The latter of these did, in fact, little more 
than carry out a suggestion of the former, so that almost 
all the influence which England has had on the theory 
of education must be attributed to Locke alone. Locke's 
authority in this subject has indeed been due chiefly to 
his fame as a philosopher. His ^'' Thoughts on Edu- 
cation," had they proceeded from an unknown author, 
would probably have never gained him a reputation even 
in his native country; and yet, when we read them as 
the work of the great philosopher, we feel that they are 
not unworthy of him. He was no enthusiast, conscious of 
a mission to renovate the human race by some grand 
educational discovery, but as a man of calm good sense, 
who found himself encharged with the bringing up of a 



86 ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

young nobleman, he examined the ordinary education 
of the day, and when it proved unsatisfactory, he set 
about such alterations as seemed expedient. His thoughts 
were written for the advice of a friend, and, as we may 
infer from the title, are not intended as a complete 
treatise. The book, however, has placed its author in 
the first rank of those innovators whose innovations, after 
a struggle of two hundred years, have not been adopted, 
and yet seem now more than ever likely to make their 
way. 

Locke's " Thoughts on Education/' Locke's thoughts 
were concerned exclusively with the training of a young- 
gentleman, at a time when gentlemen were a caste 
having little in common with ^*^the abhorred rascality." 
The education of those of inferior station might be of 
interest and importance to individuals, but the nation 
was chiefly concerned with the bringing up of its gen- 
tlemen. ^^ That most to be taken care of,'' he writes, 
" is the gentleman's calling ; for if those of that rank 
are by their education once set right, they will quickly 
bring all the rest into order." 

Education by a Tutor ; against Public Schools. Locke 
would have the education of a gentleman intrusted 
to a tutor. His own experience had made him no 
friend to grammar-schools, and while he admits the 
inconveniences of home education, he makes light 
of them in comparison with the dangers of a sys- 
tem in which the influence of schoolmates is greater 
than that of schoolmasters. Locke's argument is this : 
It is the business of the master to train the pupils 
in virtue and good manners, much more than to- 



LOCKE. 87 



communicate learning. This function, however, must 
of necessity be neglected in schools. ^^Not that I 
blame the schoolmaster in this, or think it to be 
laid to his charge. The difference is great between 
two or three pupils in the same house and three or 
fourscore boys lodged up and down ; for let the mas- 
ter's industry and skill be never so great, it is impos- 
sible that he should have fifty or a hundred scholars 
under his eye any longer than they are in the school 
together ; nor can it be expected that he should instruct 
them successfully in anything but their books ; the 
forming of their minds and manners requiring a con- 
stant attention and particular application to every single 
boy, which is impossible in a numerous flock, and would 
be wholly in vain (could he have time to study and cor- 
rect every one's particular defects and wrong inclina- 
tions), when the lad was to be left to himself, or the 
prevailing infection of his fellows the greatest part of 
the four-and-twenty hours." Again he says, ''Till you 
can find a school wherein it is possible for the master to 
look after the manners of his scholars, and can show as 
great effects of his care of forming their minds to virtue 
and their carriage to good-breeding, as of forming their 
tongues to the learned languages, you must confess that 
you have a strange value for words when preferring the 
languages of the ancient G-reeks and Romans to that 
which made them such brave men, you think it worth 
while to hazard your son's innocence for a little Greek 
and Latin. For as for that boldness and spirit which 
lads get amongst their playfellows at school, it has ordi- 
narily such a mixture of rudeness and ill-turned confi- 



88 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

dence that those misbecoming and disingenuous ways of 
shifting in the world must be unlearned^ and all tincture 
washed out again to make way for better principles and 
such manners as make a trustworthy man. He that 
considers how diametrically opposite the skill of living 
well and managing as a man should do his affairs in the 
world is to that malapertness, tricker}^, or violence learnl 
amongst schoolboys, will think the faults of a private/ 
education infinitely to be preferred to such improve, 
ments, and will take care to preserve his chikrs inno. 
cence and modesty at home, as being more of kin and 
more in the way of those qualities which make a useful 
and able man/^ 

Virtue and Good Manners more Valuable than School 
Learning. If we consider how far Locke is undoubtedly 
right in these remarks, we shall agree with him at least 
in two things : 1st, that virtue and good manners are 
more valuable than school learning, or, indeed, any 
learning ; 2d, that the influence of the masters over the 
boys' characters in a large school (and I may add, in a 
small school also), is less than the influence of the boys 
on one another. Moreover, those who know much of 
schoolboys will probably admit that their average mo- 
rality is not high. Though not without strong generous 
impulses, the ordinary schoolboy-character is marked by 
selfishness — not a premeditated, calculating selfishness, 
but one which arises from the absence of high motives, 
and from a tacit understanding among boys that the 
rule is, *' Every one for himself.'' High motives are no 
doubt uncommon in adult age, and the same rule is 
sometimes acted on then also, but custom requires us. 



LOCKE. 89 

except in the case of very near relations, to treat one 
another with outward respect and consideration — in 
other words, to behave unselfishly in social intercourse, 
and no such custom is established among schoolboys. 
They are, therefore, as a rule unmannerly in their be- 
havior to one another. Vices, moreover, though not so 
prevalent as bad manners, are well known in all schools. 
Lying is often found, especially among young boys ; 
bad language, and worse, among younger and elder 
alike. The natural deduction would seem to be that 
large schools are the worst possible places in which to 
train boys to virtue and good manners. 

Locke's Argument Examined. This deduction, how- 
ever, is very far from the truth. The direct influence 
of the private tutor is, I believe, less, and the indirect 
influence of the masters of a school more, than Locke 
and those who side with him imagine. Indeed, the in- 
fluence of a really great head-master over the whole 
school is immense, as was proved by Dr. Arnold. Then, 
again, the system and the traditions of a great school 
are very powerful, and almost compel a boy to aim at 
the established standard of excellence, whereas the boy 
at home has no such standard before him, and the boy 
at the small school may possibly have one which is 
worse than none at all. As far as our character de- 
pends on others, it is formed mainly by our companions 
at every age. Men have not enough in common with 
boys to be their companions, even when they are never 
out of their company. The character of boys must, 
therefore, be formed chiefly by loySy and where they as- 
sociate together in large numbers and are allowed as 



90 £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS, 



much freedom as is consistent with discipline, the healthy 
feeling of '^'^open-airiness/Hhe common sense of most, 
and the love of right which is found ultimately both in 
boys and men, prove most powerful in checking flagrant 
wrong-doing and forming a type of character which has 
many good points in it. 

The Argument from Results. But whichever side 
may seem to have the best of the argument, our public 
schools may fairly meet their assailants by an appeal to 
results. We know, indeed, that parents, as a rule, are 
too careless about the learning their boys acquire at 
Eaton and Harrow, and that many leave these schools 
with little Latin, less Greek, and no book knowledge 
besides ; but parents are not yet indifferent about the 
morals and manners of their children, and if it were 
found that the generality of public school-men were less 
virtuous and less gentlemanly than the generality of 
those who had been educated elsewhere, our public 
schools could hardly enjoy their present popularity. 

Locke's Exaggerated Idea of Eifects of Schools. Locke 
had himself acquired great influence over his pupil, a 
delicate youth, who, under Locke's care, became a strong 
man. By this the philosopher was led to exaggerate the 
effects of formal education so much, that he ascribes to 
it nine parts out of ten in every man. I believe this 
estimate to be quite erroneous. Nature seems to have 
placed a fairly healthy state, both of body and mind, as 
it were in stable equilibrium. There are certain things 
necessary for the existence of the body — food, air, exer- 
cise. But when a sufficient amount of these is once 
secured, the quantity and quality may vary considerably. 



LOCKE. 91 



without making any important diUerence. Moreover, 
the healthy body has, to some extent, the power of re- 
sisting noxious influences. If we were as liable to injuries 
as anxious mothers suppose, we should have to give 
almost all our time and attention to the care of our 
health, and even then could hardly hope to preserve it. 
The same, probably, is true of the mind, though not to 
so great a degree. 

These facts are fully recognized by the majority of 
mankind, who look to them for a justification of laissez 
faire (let alone). But writers on education, on dietet- 
ics, and the like, in their great zeal against laissez faire, 
generally run into the opposite extreme, and talk as if 
narrow indeed were the way that leads to health, and as 
if only the few who implicitly followed their directions 
could ever find it. 

If I agreed with Locke, that nine parts out of ten in 
the pupil were due to the master, I should also agree 
that the master of a school could not bestow proper atten- 
tion on all the boys. 

Locke on Physical Education. As Locke had studied 
medicine, and had been prevented from undertaking the 
cure of other people^s maladies only by his own, he 
naturally attached great importance to physical educa- 
tion, and begins his work with it. He was a champion 
of the hardening system, which has, no doubt, as Mr. H. 
Spencer puts it, hardened many children out of the 
world. Scanty clothing, thin boots with holes to admit 
wet, hard fare, and irregular meals, are now condemned 
by all our best authorities. In other particulars, where 
he seems more happy, Locke's suggestions have become 



92 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

established customs. We have got to believe in the use 
of cold water, though we should not think to appease 
the fears of mothers by quoting the example of Seneca. 
But there are two or three points in Locke's very prac- 
tical directions which are still worth special attention. 
He urges that all clothes should be loose, and speaks as 
emphatically as every doctor has spoken since against 
the madness of ^^ strait-lacing.^' He rejoices that mothers 
can not attempt any improvements in their children's 
shapes before birth ; otherwise, says he, we should have 
no perfect children born. Do we not seem to hear the 
voice of Rousseau ? 

Another point on which he is very emphatic is, that 
action of the bowels should be secured daily at the same 
hour by the force of habit. 

On Dosing with Physic, The following quotation 
would have been thought folly only a few years ago. 
Now, it has a chance of a fair hearing. " Have a great 
care of tampering that way [i.e., with apothecaries' 
medicines], lest, instead of preventing, you draw on dis- 
eases. Nor even upon every little indisposition is physio 
to be given, or the physician called to children, especially 
if he be a busy man that will presently fill their windows 
with gallipots and their stomachs with drugs. It is safer 
to leave them wholly to Nature than to put them into 
the hands of one forward to tamper, or that thinks chil- 
dren are to be cured in ordinary distempers by anything 
but diet, or by a method very little distant from it ; it 
seeming suitable both to my reason and experience, that 
the tender constitutions of children should have as little 
done to them as possible, and as the absolute necessity 



LOCKE. 93 



of tlie case requires/^ Among many practical sugges- 
tions which he gives in this part of the book, the follow- 
ing shows that his hardening discipline did not proceed 
from want of sympathy with the little ones. '' Let chil- 
dren be very carefully aroused in the morning with the 
voice only, and let them have nothing but kind treat- 
ment before they are wide awake." * 

Summary of Health Maxims. Locke's own summing 
up of his recommendations concerning the body and 
health is: "Plenty of open air, exercise, and sleep, plain 
diet, no wine or strong drink, and very little or no 
physic ; not too warm and strait clothes, especially the 
head and feet kept cold, and the feet often used to cold 
water, and exposed to wet." 

^' As the strength of the body lies chiefly in being able 
to endure hardships, so also does that of the mind, and 
the great principle and foundation of all virtue and 
worth is placed in this — that a man is able to deny him- 
self his own desires, cross his own inclinations, and 
purely follow what reason directs as best, though the 
appetite leans the other way." 

Again, he says, " He that has not mastery over his in- 
clinations, he that knows not how to resist the importu- 
nity of present pleasure or pain, for the sake of what 
reason tells him is fit to be done, wants the true prin- 
ciple of virtue and industry, and is in danger of never 
being good for anything. This temper, therefore, so 
contrary to unguided Nature, is to be got betimes ; and 

* Locke is, however, only copying from Montaigne, who tells 
\is that, in his childhood, his father had him awakened by music. 



94 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

this habit, as the true foundation of future ability and 
happiness, is to be wrought into the mind, as early as 
may be, even from the first dawnings of any knowledge 
or apprehension in children, and so to be confirmed in 
them, by all the care and ways imaginable, by those who 
have the oversight of their education." Here the philos- 
opher seems to ground all virtue on Reason. Less in- 
tellectual people might be inclined to seek the ground of 
most virtue in the affections. 

Self-denial to be Taught from the Cradle. "The 
practice of self-denial," says Locke, *^' is to be got and 
improved by custom — made easy and familiar by an 
early practice. The practice should be begun from their 
very cradles. Whenever the children craved what was 
not fit for them to have, they should not be permitted 
it because they were little and desired it. Nay, whatever 
they were importunate for, they should be sure, for that 
very reason, to be denied. The younger they are, the 
less, I think, are their unruly and disorderly appetites 
to be complied with ; and the less reason they have of 
their own, the more are they to be under the absolute 
power and restraint of those in whose hands they are. 
From which, I confess, it will follow, that none but dis- 
creet people should be about them." 

Authority of Parent to be Established Early. " Be 
sure to establish the authority of a father as soon as the 
child is capable of submission, and can understand in 
whose power he is. If you w^ould have him stand in awe 
of you, imprint it in his infancy, and as he approaches 
more to a man admit him nearer to your familiarity, so 
shall you have him your obedient subject (as is fit) whilst 



LOCKE. 95 

lie is a child, and your affectionate friend when he is a 
man." This passage advises a complete inversion of the 
ordinary mode, which is to fondle children when young, 
and to ^Mveep them in their proper place " by a more 
distant behavior, and by the more rigorous exercise of 
authority, as they grow up. But is not the treatment 
which estranges the son from the father wrong in both 
cases ? The difference of age puts only too great a gulf 
between them already. To make either the child or 
young man stand in awe of his father is not exactly the 
way to bridge this gulf over. This can only be done by 
the father's endeavoring to enter into the feelings of the 
son, and seeking his sympathy in return. As for estab- 
lishing the parental authority, a consistent firmness will 
do this without the aid of " the power derived from fear 
and awe." 

Great Severity very Improper. But, whilst advising 
that whatsoever rigor is necessary should be '^the 
more used the younger children are," Locke is very 
strong against great severity. The children must be 
taught self-denial ; but, on the other side, ^' if the mind 
be curbed and humbled too much in children, if their 
spirits be debased and humbled much by too strict a hand 
over them, they lose all their vigor and industry, and are 
in a worse state than [in the other extreme]. For ex- 
travagant young fellows that have liveliness and spirit 
come sometimes to be set right, and so make able and 
great men, but dejected minds, timorous and tame, and 
low spirits are hardly ever to be raised, and very seldom 
attain to anything." '^ Slavish discipline makes slavish 
temper, and so leads to hypocrisy; and where it is most 



96 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

successful, it breaks the mind, and then you have a low- 
spirited, moped creature, who however with his unnat- 
ural sobriety he may please silly people, who commend 
tame, inactive children because they make no noise, nor 
give them any trouble, yet, at last, will probably prove as 
uncomfortable a thing to his friends, as he will be all his 
life a useless thing to himself and others." "To avoid 
the danger that is on either hand, is the great art ; and 
he that has found a way how to keep up a child's spirit 
easy, active, and free, and yet at the same time to re- 
strain him from many things he has a mind to, and to 
draw him to things that are uneasy to him ; he, I say, 
that knows how to reconcile these seeming contradic- 
tions, has, in my opinion, got the true secret of educa- 
tion/' 

Corporal Punishment to be Sparingly used. No corpo- 
ral punishment, Locke tells us, is useful where the 
shame of suffering for having done amiss does not work 
more than the pain ; otherwise, we merely teach boys to 
act from the worst motives of all — regard to bodily pleas- 
ure or pain. The tutor must be sparing in his correc- 
tion, for it is his business to create a liking for learning, 
and " children come to hate things which were at first 
acceptable to them, when they find themselves whipped 
and chid and teazed about them. . . Offensive cir- 
cumstances ordinarily infect innocent things which they 
are joined with, and the very sight of a cup wherein any 
one uses to take nauseous physic turns his stomach so 
that nothing will relish well out of it, though the cup be 
never so clean and well-shaped, and of the richest mate- 
rials." From this, Locke would almost seem to agree 



LOCKE. 97 



with Comenius, that no punishment should be connected 
with learning. The notion may appear Utopian, but 
if boys could once be interested in their work it would 
not be found so.* 

The Mind can not act in Seasons of Depression. In 
passing, I may observe that teachers of a kindly disposi- 
tion are sometimes guilty of great cruelty, from neglect- 
ing the truth Locke dwells upon with such emphasis, 
yiz., that the mind will not act during any depression of 
the animal spirits. A boy fails to say his task, and he 
is kept in till he does: or he can not be made to under- 
stand some simple matter, and the teacher^s patience gets 
exhausted, when he has explained the thing again and 
again, and then can get no answer, or only an utterly 
absurd answer to the easiest question about it. Perhaps 
the boy is not a stupid boy, so the master accuses him 
of sullen inattention. The truth is, that the boy is 
frightened or dejected, and his mind no longer works at 
the command of the will. As Locke says, "It is impos- 
sible children should learn anything whilst their thoughts 
are possessed and disturbed with any passion, especially 
fear, which makes the strongest impression on their yet 

* Since I wrote the above, a remark from a schoolboy of more 
than average industry (or, perhaps I ought to say, of less than 
average laziness) has rather shaken me in this opinion : " Some- 
how I can't get up my work for Mr. : we never get any thing 

if we don't." Both boys and grown people are apt to shrink from 
exertion where there is no must in the case, even though the exer- 
tion be not in itself distasteful to them. I doubt, therefore, if a 
wise master would entirely give up compulsion, though he would 
never apply it to young children, or trust to it exclusively in the 
case of older pupils. 



98 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

tender and weak spirits. Keep the mind in an easy, 
calm temper, when you would have it receive your in- 
structions, or any increase of knowledge. It is as im- 
possible to draw fair and regular characters on a trem- 
bling mind, as on a shaking paper." We all know, from 
our own experience, that when the mind is disturbed, or 
jaded, it no longer obeys the will, and yet in school-work 
we always consider the lads' mental power a constant 
quantity. Miss Davies well says : " Probably, if the 
truth were known, it would be found that injustice and 
unkindness are comparatively seldom caused by harsh- 
ness of disposition. They are the result of an incapacity 
for imagining ourselves to be somebody else** (^^ Higher 
Education of Women," p. 137). This I take to be 
especially true of the unkindness of schoolmasters. 

Rewards and Punishments — Esteem and Disgrace. 
Eewards and punishments are largely employed in 
Locke's mode of education ; but they are to be the 
rewards and punishments of the mind — esteem and dis- 
grace. The sense of honor should be carefully cultivated. 
Whatever commendation the child deserved should be 
bestowed openly ; the blame should be in private. Flog- 
ging is to be reserved for stubbornness and obstinate dis- 
obedience. Locke concludes his advice on discipline by 
saying, that if the right course be taken with children, there 
will not be so much need of the application of the com- 
mon rewards and punishments as usage has established. 
Children should not be too much checked. ''The game- 
some humor, which is wisely adapted by nature to their 
age and temper, should rather be encouraged to keep up 
their spirits and to improve their strength and health. 



LOCKE. g<^ 



than curbed and restrained ; and the chief art is to make 
all that they have to do, sport and play too." 

On Maiiliers. Locke's observations about manners and 
affectation have merely an historic interest. The danc- 
ing-master has a higher role allotted him than he plays 
in our present education. Locke writes : "Since noth- 
ing appears to me to give children so much becoming 
confidence and behavior, and so to raise them to the 
conversation of those above their age, as dancing, I think 
they should be taught to dance as soon as they are capable 
of learning it. For though this consists only in outward 
gracefulness of motion, yet, I know not how, it gives 
children manly thoughts and carriage more than any- 
thiTig. But, otherwise," he adds, '^I would not have 
little children much tormented about punctilios, or 
niceties of breeding." Good company will teach them 
good manners. '' Children (nay, and men too) do most 
by example. We are all a sort of cameleons, that still 
take a tincture from things near us ; nor is it to be 
wondered at in children, who better understand what 
they see than what they hear." 

When speaking of company, Locke points out the 
harm done by clownish or vicious servants. To avoid 
this, the children must be kept as much as possible in 
the company of their parents ; and by being allowed all 
proper freedom, must be led to take pleasure in it. 

Seasons of Aptitude and Inclination. Although I 
would go much further than most schoolmasters in en- 
deavoring to make the pupil's intellectual exertions ;?Ze«5- 
urable to him, I can not go all the way with Locke. His 
directions, though impracticable in a school, might. 



lOO ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

perhaps, be carried out by a private tutor — with, I should 
say, by no means satisfactory results. One employment 
Locke seems to think is, in itself, as pleasurable as an- 
other; so, if nothing which has to be learnt is made a 
burden, or imposed as a task, the pupil will like work 
just as well as play. ''Let a child be but ordered ta 
whip his top at a certain time every day, whether he has, 
or has not, a mind to it; let this be but required of him 
as a duty wherein he must spend so many hours morning 
and afternoon, and see whether he will not be soon wearj 
of any play at this rate/' The tutor should, therefore, 
be on the watch for ^'Seasons of Aptitude and Inclina- 
tion" and so "make learning as much a recreation to 
their play, as their play is recreation to their learning."' 
Locke gives, however, two cautions, which might be 
found rather to clog the wheels of the chariot — first, the 
child is not to be allowed to grow idle : and secondly, the 
mind must be taught mastery over itself, ''which will 
be an advantage of more consequence than Latin or logic,. 
or most of those things children are usually required to- 
learn." His scheme is no doubt an admirable one, if it 
can be carried out with these qualifications. 

Ko Harshness to be used in Instruction. As we have 
seen, Locke was opposed to any harshness about lessons, 
though much seems to have been used in schools of that 
period. "Why," asks Locke, "does the learning of 
Latin and Greek need the rod, when French and Italian 
need it not ? Children learn to dance and fence without 
whipping ; nay, arithmetic, drawing, etc., they apply 
themselves well enough to without beating; which 
would make me suspect that there is something strange. 



LOCKE. lOI 



nimaturdl, and disagreeable to that age, in the things 
required in grammar-schools, or in the methods used 
there, that children can not be brought to without the 
severity of the lash, and hardly with that too; or else it 
is a mistake that those tongues could not be taught them 
without beating." 

On Reasoning with Children. Instead of this harsh- 
ness, Locke would use reasoning with children. '^ This,^' 
says he, *^they understand as early as they do language; 
and, if I misobserve not, they love to be treated as 
rational creatures sooner than is imagined. It is a pride 
should be cherished in them, and as much as can be 
made an instrument to turn them by." 

Necessary Qualifications in a Tutor. In the necessary 
qualifications of the tutor, the first and principal, ac- 
cording to Locke, are breeding and knowledge of the 
world. ^^ Courage, in an ill-bred man, has the air, and 
escapes not the opinion, of brutality. Learning becomes 
pedantry; wit, buffoonery; plainness, rusticity; good- 
nature, fawning; and there can not be a good quality in 
him which want of breeding will not warp and disfigure 
to his disadvantage/' By means of the tutor's knowledge 
of the world, Locke hoped to protect the pupil against 
the dangers which beset " an old boy, at his first appear- 
ance, with all the gravity of his ivy-bush about him;'' 
but he who is to steer a vessel over a difficult course, will 
hardly fit himself for the task by taking lessons even 
of the most skillful pilot, on shore. 

Locke's account of the work of a tutor gives so much 
insight into his notion of education generally, that it 
seems worth quoting at length ; — 



I02 ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Work of the Tutor. " The great work of a governor 
is to fashion the carriage and form the mind, to settle in 
his pupil good habits and the principles of virtue and 
wisdom, to give him, by little and little, a view of man- 
kind, and work him into a love and imitation of what is 
excellent and praiseworth}''; and, in the prosecution of it, 
to give him vigor, activity, and industry. The studies 
which he sets him upon are but, as it were, the exercises 
of his faculties and employment of his time; to keep 
him from sauntering and idleness; to teach him applica- 
tion, and accustom him to take pains, and to give him 
some little taste of what his own industry must perfect. 
For who expects that under a tutor, a young gentleman 
should be an accomplished orator or logician ? go to the 
bottom of metaphysics, natural philosophy, or mathe- 
matics ? or be a master in history or chronology ? 
Though something of each of these is to be taught him ; 
but it is only to open the door that he may look in and, 
as it were, begin an acquaintance, but not to dwell there; 
and a governor would be much blamed that should keep 
his pupil too long, and lead him too far in most of them. 
But of good breeding, knowledge of the world, virtue,, 
industry, and a love of reputation he can not have too 
much; and if he have these he will not long want what 
he needs or desires of the other. And since it can not 
be hoped that he should have time and strength to learn 
all things, most pains should be taken about that whick 
is most necessary, and that principally looked after which 
will be of most and frequentest use to him in the 
world/^ 

Locke's Estimate of the Learning of his Day. It is 



LOCKE. 103 



curious to observe how little store Locke sets by learning. 
Indeed, it would seem that in those days school-learning 
was even more estranged from the business of life than it 
has been since. ^'A great part of the learning now in 
fashion in the schools of Europe/^ says Locke, "and 
that goes ordinarily into the round of education, a gentle- 
man may, in good measure, be unfurnished with, without 
any great disparagement to himself, or prejudice to his 
affairs.'* Again he says, *^ We learn not to live, but to 
dispute, and our education fits us rather for the univer- 
sity than for the world. But it is no wonder, if those 
who make the fashion suit it to loliat they have, and not 
to tuhat their pupils ivant.^' This last remark is not 
without its application even in our time. 

Combining Amusement with Instruction. When we 
come to Locke's directions about teaching we find him 
carrying out his notion of combining amusement with 
instruction. " Children should not have anything like 
work or serious study laid on them ; neither their minds 
nor bodies will bear it. It injures their healths; and their 
being forced and tied down to their books in an age at 
enmity with all such restraints has, I doubt not, been 
the reason why a great many have hated books and learn- 
ing all their lives after. It is like a surfeit, that leaves an 
aversion behind that can not be removed. '* "I know a 
person of great quality (more yet to be honored for his 
learning and virtue than for his rank and high place), 
who by pasting on the six vowels (for in our language 'y' 
is one) on the six sides of a die, and the remaining 18 
consonants on the sides of three other dice, has made 
this a play for his children, that he shall win, who, at 



I04 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

one cast, throws most words on these four dice, whereby 
his eldest son, yet in coats, has ^Z«_yef? himself into sjjell- 
ing with great eagerness, and without once having been 
chid for it, or forced to it." 

Children's Reading. AVhen the child has acquired 
reading, he should have some amusing book, such as 
JEsop and Keynard the Fox. Pictures of animals, with 
the names printed below them, should be shown him 
from the time he knows his letters. He is to be encour- 
aged to give an account of his reading. ''^Children,'' 
says Locke, ^'are commonly not taught to make any use 
of their reading, and so get to look upon books as 
" fashionable amusements or impertinent troubles, good 
for nothing.'^ 

For religious instruction, the child should learn some 
easy Catechism, and should read some portions of Scrip- 
ture, but should not be allowed to read the whole Bible. 

Penmanship and Drawing. When he begins to learn 
writing, he must be perfect in holding his pen, before 
paper is put before him: "for not only children, but 
anybody else that would do anything well, should never 
be put upon too much of it at once, or be set to perfect 
themselves in two parts of an action at the same time, 
if they can possibly be separated." The child should 
then be given paper, on which is red-ink writing, in 
large hand. This writing he is to go over with black ink. 

He is next to learn drawing, "a thing very useful to 
a gentleman on several occasions ;" but in this, as in all 
other things not absolutely necessary, the rule holds 
good, "Nihil invita Minerva." (Nothing against the 
natural bent.) 



LOCKE. 105 



On Latin and French. He should now learn French. 
*' People are accustomed to the right way of teaching 
that language, which is by talking it unto children in 
constant conversation, and not by grammatical rules. 
The Latin tongue might easily be taught in the same 
way." 

'• 'iLitin," says Locke, *' I look upon as absolutely nec- 
essary to a gentleman." But he ridicules the folly of 
sending boys to grammar-schools, when they are in- 
tended for trade. "Yet, if you ask the parents why 
they do this, they think it as strange a question as if 
you should ask them why they go to church. Custom 
stands for reason; and has, to those who take it for rea- 
son, so consecrated the method, that it is almost relig- 
iously observed by them, and they stick to it as if their 
children had scarce an orthodox education unless they 
learn Lily^s Grammar." 

Latin to be Taught in Conversation. But, though 
Latin should be taught to gentlemen, this should be 
done by conversation, and thus time might be gained 
for '^ several sciences : such as are a good part of geog- 
raphy, astronomy, chronology, anatomy, besides some 
parts of history, and all other parts of knowledge of 
things that fall under the senses, and require little more 
than memory: for there, if we would take the true way, 
our knowledge should begin, and in those things should 
be laid the foundations ; and not in the abstract notions 
of logic and metaphysics, which are fitter to amuse than 
inform the understanding in its first setting out toward 
knowledge." Again he says, "The learning of Latin 
being nothing but the learning of words, a very unpleas- 



Io6 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

ant business to both young and old, join as much other 
real knowledge * with it as you can, beginning still with 
that which lies most obvious to the senses; such as is 
the knowledge of minerals, plants, and animals; and 
particularly timber and fruit trees, their parts, and 
ways of propagation, wherein a great deal may be taught 
the child which will not be useless to the man : but 
more especially, geography, astronomy, and anatomy.'' 
He would also introduce some geometry. 

Objections Answered. But Locke was not blind to 
the difficulty that few teachers would be found capable 
of talking Latin. He would, therefore, have the mother 
make a beginning by getting a Latin Testament with 
the quantities marked, and reading it with her children. 
He also suggests the use of interlinear translations. 
'' Take,'' says he, " some easy and pleasant book, such 
as jEsop's Fables, and write the English translation 
(made as literal as can be) in one line, and the Latin 
words which answer each of them, just over it in an- 
other. These let the child read every day, over and 
over again, till he perfectly understands the Latin, and 
then go on to another fable, till he be also perfect in that, 
not omitting what he is already perfect in, but some- 
times reviewing that, to keep it in his memory. And 
when he comes to write, let these be set him for copies, 
which, with the exercise of his hand, will also advance 

*Real knowledge is here knowledge of things, as distinguished 
from all other knowledge. Our loss of this meaning of the word 
real shows how small has been the influence of the Innovators in 
this country. Both the word and the party have been more suc- 
cessful in Germany. 



LOCKE. 107 



him in Latin. This being a more imperfect way than 
by talking Latin unto him, the formation of the verbs 
first, and afterward the declension of the nouns and 
pronouns i3erfectly learned by heart, may facilitate his 
acquaintance with the genius and manner of tiie Latin 
tongue, which varies the signification of the verbs and 
nouns not, as the modern languages do, by particles 
prefixed, but by changing the last syllables. More than 
this of grammar I think he need not have till he can 
read himself ^ Sanctii Minerva,' with Scioppius and Peri- 
zonius' notes." It is no objection to his plan, he says, 
that children w411 learn merely by rote. 

How Languages are to be Learned. Languages must 
be learned by rote, and used without any thought of 
grammar : " if grammar ought to be taught at any time, 
it must be to one that can speak the language already : 
how else can he be taught the grammar of it V* 
''Grammar is, in fact, an introduction to rhetoric."* 
*' I grant the grammar of a language is sometimes veiy 
carefully to be studied; but it is only to be studied by 
a grown man, when he applies himself to the under- 
standing of any language critically, which is seldom the 
business of any but professed scholars." This, I think, 
will be agreed to, that if a gentleman be to study any 

* Much confusion has arisen, as Bishop Dupanloup has observed, 
from the double use of the word grammar; first, for the science 
of language, and second, for the mere statement of the facts of a 
language. Those who teach what is called "Latin Grammar" 
to children may argue that they only teach them, in order and 
connection, facts which they would otherwise have to pick up 
at random. See also M. Arnold : ScJiools, etc., p. 83. 



I08 ESSAYS ON- EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

language, it ought to be that of his own country, that 
he may understand the language which he has constant 
use of, with the utmost accuracy/' And yet "young 
gentlemen are forced to learn the grammars of foreign 
and dead languages, and are never once told of the 
grammar of their own tongue; they do not so much as 
know that there is any such thing, much less is it made 
their business to be instructed in it. Nor is their own 
language ever proposed to them as worthy their care and 
cultivating, though they have daily use of it, and are 
not seldom, in the future course of their lives, judged 
of by their handsome or awkward way of expressing 
themselves in it. Whereas the languages whose gram- 
mars they have been so much employed in, are such as 
probably they shall scarce ever speak or write; or if, 
upon occasion, this should happen, they should be ex- 
cused for the mistakes and faults they make in it. 
Would not a Chinese, who took notice of this way of 
breeding, be apt to imagine that all our young gentle- 
men were designed to be teachers and professors of the 
dead languages of foreign countries, and not to be men 
of business in their own ?" 

Difficulties sometimes to be Raised. Locke grants that 
in some sciences where their reasons are to be exercised, 
difficulties may be proposed, on purpose to excite industry, 
and accustom the mind to employ its own strength and 
sagacity in solving them. ^'But yet," he continues, ^'I 
guess this is not to be done to children whilst very young, 
nor at their entrance upon any sort of knowledge. Then 
everything of itself is difficult, and the great use and 
skill of a teacher is to make all as easy as he can." 



LOCKE. 109 

Improper Themes for Composition. Locke inveighs 
strongly against the ordinary practice of writing themes 
on such subjects as ^' Omnia vincit amor/' or *^ Non Hcet 
in bello bis peccare." "Here the poor lad who wants 
knowledge of those things he is to speak of, which is to 
be had only from time and observation, must set his 
invention on the rack to say something where he 
knows nothing, which is a sort of Egyptian tyranny, to 
bid them make bricks who have not yet any of the 
materials." Verse-making found equally little favor in 
his eyes. 

Memory not Improved by Learning Long Passages. He 
denounces also the practice of making boys say large por- 
tions of authors by heart, to strengthen the memory. 
He thinks that "the learning pages of Latin by heart 
no more fits the memory for retention of anything else 
than the graving of one sentence in lead makes it the 
more capable of retaining any other characters. If such 
a sort of exercise of the memory were to give it strength, 
and improve our parts, players, of all other people, must 
needs have the best memories, and be the best company. '^ 
" What the mind is intent upon and careful of, that it 
remembers best ; to which, if method and order be joined, 
all is done, I think, that can be for the help of a weak 
memory ; and he that will take any other way to do it, 
especially that of charging it with a train of other people's 
words, which he that learns cares not for, will, I guess, 
scarce find the profit answer half the time and pains 
employed in it." Boys, however, should learn by heart 
passages which are valuable in themselves, and these they 
should give an account of, and repeat again and again. 



no ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

that they may always remember them, and may also be 
taught to reflect on what they learn. 

Subjects to be Proposed for Discussion. As an exercise 
in English, " there should be proposed to young gentle- 
men rational and useful questions suited to their age and 
capacities, and on subjects not wholly unknown to them, 
nor out of their way. Such as these, when they are ripe 
for exercises of this nature, they should extempore, or 
after a little meditation upon the spot, speak to, without 
penning of anything." Even at an earlier age children 
should often tell a story of anything they know, such as 
a fable from ^sop ("the only book almost that I know 
fit for children"), and at first the teacher is to correct 
only the most remarkable fault they are guilty of in their 
way of putting it together. They must also write nar- 
ratives, and, when more advanced, letters. "They must 
also read those things that are well writ in English, to 
perfect their style in the purity of our language; for, 
since it is English that an English gentleman will have 
constant use of, that is the language he should chiefly 
cultivate, and wherein most care should be taken to 
polish and perfect his style." 

On Disputation. On another point he was at variance 
with the custom of his day. '^If the use and end of 
right reasoning," he says, "be to have right notions and 
a right judgment of things, to distinguish between truth 
and falsehood, right and wrong, and to act accordingly, 
be sure not to let your son be bred up in the art and 
formality of disputing, either practicing it himself or 
admiring it in others." Of logic and rhetoric he also 
speaks very disparagingly. 



LOCKE. 1 1 1 



To the studies already mentioned, viz., geography, 
chronology, history, astronomy, anatomy, Locke would 
add the principles of civil law and the laws of England. 

On Physics. ^' Natural philosophy, as a speculative 
science," writes Locke, "I imagine we have none; and 
perhaps I may think I have reason to say we never shall 
be able to make a science of it. The works of Nature 
are contrived by a Wisdom and operate by ways too far 
surpassing our faculties to discover, or capacities to con- 
ceive, for us ever to be able to reduce them to a science." 
He allows, however, that '^ the incomparable Mr. Newton 
has shown how far mathematics, applied to some parts 
of Nature, may, upon principles that matter of fact 
justifies, carry us in the knowledge of some, as I may 
call them, particular provinces of the incomprehensible 
universe." 

On Greek. Greek does not enter into Lockers curricu- 
lum. Latin and French, ^^as the world now goes," are 
required of a gentleman, but Greek only of a professed 
scholar. If the pupil has a mind to carry his studies 
further for himself, he can do so ; but, as it is, " how 
many are there of a hundred, even amongst scholars 
themselves, who retain the Greek they carried from 
school ; or ever improve it to a familiar, ready, and per- 
fect understanding of Greek authors ? " The tutor must 
remember *'that his business is not so much to teach 
the pupil all that is knowable, as to raise in him a love 
and esteem of knowledge, and to put him in the right 
way of knowing and improving himself when he has a 
mind to it." 

Music, Wrestling and Fencing. In the matter of ac- 



112 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

complishments^ Locke is rather hard upon music, "which 
leads into jovial company/^ and painting, which is a 
sedentary, and therefore not a healthy occupation. 
Wrestling he prefers to fencing. "Riding the great 
horse " (whatever that may mean) should not be made 
a business of. 

On Learning a Trade; Travel. By all means, let a 
gentleman learn at least one manual trade, especially 
such as can be practiced in the open air. This will make 
his leisure pleasant to him, and will keep him from use- 
less and dangerous pastimes. 

From the last part of education — travel — Locke thinks 
more harm is commonly derived than good : not that 
travel is bad in itself, but the time usually chosen, viz., 
from sixteen to twenty-one, is the worst time of all. 

Summary of Locke's " Thoughts." This short review of 
the '' Thoughts on Education,^' shows us that Lockers 
aim was to give a boy a robust mind in a robust body. 
His body was to endure hardness, his reason was to teach 
him self-denial. But this result was to be brought about 
by leading, not driving him. He was to be trained, not 
for the University, but for the world. Good principles, 
good manners, and discretion were to be cared lor first 
of all ; intelligence and intellectual activity next, and 
actual knowledge last of all. His spirits were to be kept 
up by kind treatment, and learning was never to be made 
a drudgery. With regard to the subjects of instruction, 
those branches of knowledge which concern things were 
to take precedence of those which consist of abstract 
ideas. The prevalent drill in the grammar of the classical 
languages was to be abandoned. The mother-tongue was 



J^OUSSEAU'S '' EMILEr II3 

to be carefully studied, and other languages acquired 
either by conversation, or by the use of translations. In 
everything, the part the pupil was to play in life was 
steadily to be kept in view; and the ideal which Locke 
proposed was not the finished scholar, but the finished 
gentleman. 



K 



V. 

ROUSSEAU'S '' EMILE." 



No School Monopolizes the Truth. In education, as 
in politics, no school of thinkers has succeeded, or can 
succeed, in engrossing all truth to itself. No party, no 
individual even, can take up a central position between 
the Conservatives and Radicals, and, judging everything 
on its own merits, try to preserve that only which is 
worth preserving, and to destroy just that which is 
worth destroying. Nor do we find that judicial minds 
often exercise the greatest influence in these matters. 
The only force which can overcome the vis inerticB (force 
of inertia) of use and wont is enthusiasm, and this, 
springing from the discovery of new truths and hatred 
of old abuses, can hardly exist with due respect for truth 
that has become commonplace, and usage which is easily 
confounded with corruptions that disfigure it. So 
advances are made somewhat after this manner : the 
reformer, urged on by his enthusiasm, attacks use and 
wont with more spirit than discretion. Those who are 



114 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

wedded to things as they are, try to draw attention from 
the weak points of their system, to the mistakes or 
extravagances of the reformer. In the end, both sides 
are benefited by the encounter, and when their successors 
carry on the contest, they differ as much from those 
whose causes they espouse as from each other. 

Good Results of the Opposition of Conservative and Re- 
former. In this way we have already made great progress. 
Compare, for instance, our present teaching of grammar 
with the ancient method ; and our short and broken 
school-time with the old plan of keeping boys in for five 
consecutive hours twice a day. Our Conservatives and 
Eeformers are not so much at variance as their predeces- 
sors. To convince ourselves of this w^e have only to con- 
sider the state of parties in the second half of the 
last century. On the one side we find the schoolmasters 
who turned out the courtiers of Louis XV.; on the 
other, the most extravagant, the most eloquent, the most 
reckless of innovators — J. J. Kousseau. 

Rousseau's Fixed Principles. Rousseau has told us 
that he resolved on having fixed principles by the time 
he was forty years old. Among the principles of which 
he accordingly laid in a stock, were these : 1st, Man, as 
he might be, is perfectly good; 2d, Man, as he is, 
is utterly bad. To maintain these opinions, Rousseau 
undertook to show, not only the rotten state of the ex- 
isting society, which he did with notable success, but 
also the proper method of rearing children so as to make 
them all that they ought to be — an attempt at construc- 
tion which was far more difiicult and hazardous than his 
philippics. 



ROUSSEAU'S ''AMILE." Il5 

^^Emile^^ the most Influential Educational Book ever 
Written. This was the origin of the ^^Emile/^ perhaps 
the most influential book ever written on the subject of 
education. The school to which Rousseau belonged may 
be said, indeed, to have been founded by Montaigne, and 
to have met with a champion, though not a very enthu- 
siastic champion, in Locke. But it was reserved for 
Rousseau to give this theory of education its complete 
development, and to expound it in the clearest and most 
eloquent language. In the form in which Rousseau left 
it, the theory greatly influenced Basedow and Pestalozzi, 
and still influences many educational reformers who 
differ from Rousseau as much as our schoolmasters differ 
from those of Louis XV. 

Rousseau's Radicalism. Of course as man was cor- 
rupted by ordinary education, the ideal education must 
differ from it in every respect. ^* Take the road directly 
opposite to that which is in use, and you will almost 
always do right." This was the fundamental maxim. 
So thorough a radical was Rousseau, that he scorned the 
idea of half-measures. "I had rather follow the estab- 
lished practice entirely," says he, '■^ than adopt a good 
one by halves." 

Artificial Social Life of his Time. In the society of 
that time, everything was artificial ; Rousseau therefore 
demanded a return to Nature. Parents should do their 
duty in rearing their own offspring. '^ Where there is 
no mother, there can be no child." The father should 
find time to bring up the child whom the mother has 
suckled. No duty can be more important than this. 
But although Rousseau seems conscious that family life 



Il6 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

is the natural state, he makes his model child an orphan, 
and hands him over to a governor, to be brought up in 
the country without companions. 

The Art of Beiug Ignorant. This governor is to devote 
himself, for some years, entirely to imparting to his 
pupil these difficult arts — the art of being ignorant and 
of losing time. Till he is twelve years old, Emile is to 
have no direct instruction whatever. "At that age he 
shall not know what a book is," says Eousseau ; tliough 
elsewhere we are told that he will learn to read of his 
own accord by the time he is ten, if no attempt is made 
to teach him. He is to be under no restraint, and is to 
do nothing but what he sees to be useful. 

Freedom in Childhood. Freedom from restraint is,. 
however, to be apparent, not real. As in ordinary edu- 
cation the child employs all its faculties in duping 
the master, so in education "according to Nature," the 
master is to devote himself to duping the child. " Let 
him always be his own master in appearance, and do you 
take care to be so in reality. There is no subjection so 
complete as that which preserves the appearance of 
liberty ; it is bythis means even the will is led captive." 

" The most critical interval of human nature is that 
between the hour of our birth and twelve years of age. 
This is the time, wherein vice and error take root with- 
out our being possessed of any instrument to destroy 
them." 

First Education Purely Negative. Throughout this 
season, the governor is to be at work inculcating the art 
of being ignorant and losing time. " This first part of 
education ought to be purely negative. It consists 



ROUSSEAU'S "AMILE. 



117 



neither in teaching virtue nor truth, but in guarding the 
heart from vice and the mind from error. If you could 
do nothing and let nothing be done ; if you could bring 
up your pupil healthy and robust to the age of twelve 
years, without his being able to distinguish his right 
hand from his left, the eyes of his understanding would 
be open to reason at your first lesson ; void both of 
habit and prejudice, he would have nothing in him to 
operate against your endeavors ; soon under your instruc- 
tions he would become the wisest of men. Thus, by 
setting out with doing nothing, you would produce a 
prodigy of education." 

Exercise the Body ; Keep the Mind Inactive. " Exercise 
his body, his senses, faculties, powers, but keep his mind 
inactive as long as possible. Distrust all the sentiments he 
acquires, previous to the judgment which should enable 
him to scrutinize them. Prevent or restrain all foreign 
impressions ; and in order to hinder the rise of evil, be 
not in too great a hurry to instill good ; for it is 
only such when the mind is enlightened by reason. 
Look upon every delay as an advantage : it is gaining a 
great deal to advance without losing anything. Let 
childhood ripen in children. In short, whatever lesson 
becomes necessary for them take care not to give them 
to-day, if it may be deferred without danger till to- 
morrow." 

" Do not, then, alarm yourself much about this appar- 
ent idleness. What would you say of the man, who, in 
order to make the most of life, should determine never 
to go to sleep ? You would say. The man is mad : he is 
not enjoying the time ; he is depriving himself of it : to 



Il8 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

avoid sleep he is hurrying toward death. Consider, then, 
that it is the same here, and that childhood is the sleep 
of reason/^ 

The Ideal Boy. Such is the groundwork of Eous- 
seau^s educational scheme. His ideal boy, of twelve 
yesTs old, is to be a thoroughly well-developed animal, 
with every bodily sense trained to its highest perfection. 
**^His ideas,^' says Rousseau, *^^are confined, but clear- 
he knows nothing by rote, but a great deal by experi- 
ence. If he reads less well than another child in our 
books, he reads better in the book of nature. His un- 
derstanding does not lie in his tongue, but in his brain ; 
he has less memory than judgment ; he can speak only 
one language, but then he understands what he says ; 
and although he may not talk of things so well as others, 
he will do them much better. He knows nothing at all 
of custom, fashion, or habit ; what he did yesterday has 
no influence on what he is to do to-day ; he follows no 
formula, is influenced by no authority or example, but 
acts and speaks just as it suits him. Do not, then, 
expect from him set discourses or studied manners, but 
always the faithful expression of his ideas, and the con- 
duct which springs naturally from his inclinations.''' 
Furthermore, this model child looks upon all men as 
equal, and will ask assistance from a king as readily as 
from a foot-boy. He does not understand what a com- 
mand is, but will readily do anything for another per- 
son, in order to place that person under an obligation, 
and so increase his own rights. He knows also no 
distinction between work and play. As a climax to 
ihis list of wonders, I may add that his imagination 



ROUSSEAU'S " emile:' 119 

has remained inactive, and he only sees what is true 
in reality. 

An Impracticable Scheme. The reader will probably 
have concluded, by this time, that no child can possibly 
be so educated as to resemble Emile, and, perhaps, 
further, that no wise father would so educate his son, if 
it were possible. A child who does not understand what 
a command is, and who can be induced to do anything 
for another only by the prospect of laying that person 
ander an obligation ; who has no habits, and is guided 
merely by his inclinations — such a child as this is, fortu- 
nately, nothing but a dream of Rousseau's. 

The Wisdom of the " Emile." But fantastical as Ecus- 
seau often is, the reader of his " Emile^' is struck again 
and again, not more by the charm of his language than 
by his insight into child-nature, and the wisdom of hie 
jemarks upon it. 

The " Emile'-' is a large work, and the latter part is 
interesting rather from a literary and philosophical point 
of view, than as it is connected with education. I pur- 
pose, therefore, confining my attention to the earlier 
portion of the book, and giving some of the passages, of 
which a great deal since said and written on education 
has been a comparatively insipid decoction. 

" All things are good, as their Creator made them, but 
everything degenerates in the hands of man.'' These 
are the first words of the '' Emile," and the keynote of 
Rousseau's philosophy. 

^' We are born weak, we have need of strength ; we 
are born destitute of everything, we have need of 
assistance ; we are born stupid, we have need of under- 



I20 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

standing. All that we are not possessed of at our birth, 
and which we require when grown up, is bestowed on 
us by education/-' 

The Threefold Source of Education. ^' This educa- 
tion "we receive from nature, from men, or from things. 
The internal development of our organs and faculties is 
the education of nature : the use we are taught to make 
of that development is the education given us by men ; 
and in the acquisitions made by our own experience on 
the objects that surround us, consists our education from 
things/^ ^' Since the concurrence of these three kinds 
of education is necessary to their perfection, it is by 
that one which is entirely independent of us, we must 
regulate the two others." 

Now ^^ to live is not merely to breathe ; it is to act, 
it is to make use of our organs, our senses, our facul- 
ties, and of all those parts of ourselves which give us 
the feeling of our existence. The man who has lived 
most is not he who has counted the greatest number of 
years, but he who has most thoroughly felt life." 

The aim of education, then, must be complete 
living. 

Ordinary Education Sacrifices Childhood to Acquisi' 
tion of Knowledge. But ordinary education (and here 
for a moment I am expressing my own conviction, and 
not simply reporting Rousseau), instead of seeking to 
develop the life of the child, sacrifices childhood to the 
acquirement of knowledge, or rather the semblance of 
knowledge, which it is thought will prove useful to the 
youth, or the man. Rousseau's great merit lies in his 
having exposed this fundamental error. 



ROUSSEAU'S "J^AIILE." 12 1 

Adults do not Understand Children. He says, very 
truly, " People do not understand childhood. With the 
false notions we have of it, the further we go the more 
we blunder. The wisest apply themselves to what it is 
important to men to know, without considering what 
children are in a condition to learn. They are always 
seeking the man in the child, without reflecting what he 
is before he can be a man. This is the study to which 
I have applied myself most; so that, should my practical 
scheme be found useless and chimerical, my observation 
will always turn to account. I may possibly have taken 
a very bad view of what ought to be done, but I conceive 
I have taken a good one of the subject to be wrought 
upon. Begin then by studying your pupils better; for 
most assuredly you do not at present understand them. 
So if you read my book with that view, I do not think 
it will be useless to you." "Nature requires children 
to be children before they are men. If we will pervert 
this order, we shall produce forward fruits, having 
neither ripeness nor taste, and sure soon to become 
rotten; we shall have young professors and old children. 
Childhood has its manner of seeing, perceiving, and 
thinking, peculiar to itself; nothing is more absurd than 
our being anxious to substitute our own in its stead." 
^' We never know how to put ourselves in the place of 
children; we do not enter into their ideas, we lend them 
our own: and following always our own train of thought, 
we fill their heads, even while we are discussing incon- 
testible truths, with extravagance and error." "I wish 
some judicious hand would give us a treatise on the art 
of stndying children; an art of the greatest importance 



122 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

to understand, though fathers and preceptors know not 
as yet even the elements of it." 

The Tutor should Sympathize with the Pupil. The 
governor, then, must be able to sympathize with his 
pupil, and, on this account, Eousseau requires that he 
should be young. " The governor of a child should be 
young, even as young as possible, consistent with his 
having attained necessary discretion and sagacity. I 
would have him be himself a child, that he might be- 
come the companion of his pupil, and gain his confidence 
by partaking of his amusements. There are not things 
enough in common between childhood and manhood, to 
form a solid attachment at so great a distance. Children 
sometimes caress old men, but they never love them.^' 

The Tutor's Threefold Function. The governor's 
functions are threefold: 1st, that of keeping off hurtful 
influences — no light task in Rousseau's eyes, as he re- 
garded almost every influence from the child's fellow- 
creatures as hurtful; 2d, that of developing the bodily 
powers, especially the senses; 3d, that of communicating 
the one science for children — moral behavior. In all 
these, even in the last, he must be governor rather than 
preceptor, for it is less his province to instruct than to 
conduct. He must not lay down precepts, but teach his 
pupil to discover them. "I preach a difficult art," says 
Rousseau, ''the art of guiding without precepts, and of 
doing everything by doing nothing." 

Vitality — The marked Characteristic of Children. 
The most distinctive characteristic of childhood is vital- 
ity. '' In the heart of the old man the failing energies 
concentrate themselves : in that of the child, they over- 



ROUSSEAU'S "£mile:' 123 

flow and spread outward; he is conscious of life enough 
to animate all that surrounds him. Whether he makes 
or mars, it is all one to him: he is satisfied with having 
changed the state of things; and every change is an 
action/^ This vitality is to be allowed free scope. 
Swaddling-clothes are to be removed from infants; the 
restraints of school and book-learning from children. 
Their love of action is to be freely indulged. 

Function of Teaching in Rousseau's Scheme. The 
nearest approach to teaching which Eousseau permitted, 
was that which became afterward, in the hands of Pesta- 
lozzi, the S3^stem of object-lessons. ^^As soon as a child 
begins to distinguish objects, a proper choice should be 
made in those which are presented to him/^ ^^He must 
learn to feel heat and cold, the hardness, softness, and 
weight of bodies; to judge of their magnitude, figure, 
and other sensible qualities, by looking, touching, hear- 
ing, and particularly by comparing the sight with the 
touch, and judging, by means of the eye, of the sensa- 
tion acquired by the fingers." These exercises should be 
continued through childhood. ^^A child has neither 
the strength nor the judgment of a man; but he is capa- 
ble of feeling and hearing as well, or at least nearly so. 
His palate also is as sensible, though less delicate : and 
he distinguishes odors as well, though not with the same 
nicety. Of all our faculties, the senses are perfected the 
first : these, therefore, are the first we should cultivate; 
they are, nevertheless, the only ones that are usually 
forgotten, or the most neglected." ^' Observe a cat, the 
first time she comes into a room; she looks and smells 
about; she is not easy a moment: she distrusts every- 



124 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS, 

thing till everything is examined and known. In the 
same manner does a child examine into everything, when 
he begins to walk about, and enters, if I may so say, the 
apartment of the world. All the difference is, that the 
sight, which is common to both the child and the cat, is 
in the first assisted by the feeling of the hands, and in 
the latter by the exquisite scent which nature has 
bestowed on it. It is the right or wrong cultivation of 
this inquisitive disposition that makes children either 
stupid or expert, sprightly or dull, sensible or foolish." 
The Primary Impulse to Sense-activity. The pri- 
mary impulses of man, urging him to compare his 
forces with those of the objects about him, and to dis- 
cover the sensible qualities of such objects as far as they 
relate to him, his first study is a sort of experimental 
philosophy relative to self-preservation, from which it is 
the custom to divert him by speculative studies before 
he has found his place on this earth. During the time 
that his supple and delicate organs can adjust themselves 
to the bodies on which they should act; while his senses 
are as yet exempt from illusions ; this is the time to ex- 
ercise both the one and the other in their proper func- 
tions ; this is the time to learn the sensuous relations 
which things have with us. As everything that enters 
the human understanding is introduced by the senses, 
the first reason in man is a sensitive reason ; and this 
serves as the basis of his intellectual reason. Our first 
instructors in philosophy are our feet, hands, and eyes. 
Substituting books for all this is not teaching us to 
reason, but teachiLg us to use the reasoning of others ; 
it is teaching us to believe a great deal, and never to 



RO USSEA C/'S " ^MIL E. 



know anything. '^ To exercise any art, we must begin 
by procuring the necessary implements; and to employ 
those implements to any good purpose, they should be 
made sufficiently solid for their intended use. To learn 
to think, therefore, we should exercise our limbs, and 
our organs, which are the instruments of our intelli- 
gence ; and in order to make the best use of those in- 
struments, it is necessary that the body furnishing 
them should be robust and hearty. Thus, so far is 
a sound understanding from being independent of the 
body, that it is owing to a good constitution that the 
operations of the mind are effected with facility and 
certainty." 

What Sense-training Implies. '^To exercise the 
senses is not merely to make use of them; it is to learn 
rightly to judge by them ; to learn, if I may so express 
myself, to perceive; for we know how to touch, to see 
to hear, only as we have learned. Some exercises are 
purely natural and mechanical, and serve to make the 
body strong and robust, without taking the least hold on 
the judgment: such are those of swimming, running, 
leaping, whipping a top, throwing stones, etc. All these 
are very well : but have we only arms and legs ? Have we 
not also eyes and ears; and are not these organs neces- 
sary to the expert use of the former ? Exercise, there- 
fore, not only the strength, but also all the senses that 
direct it ; make the best possible use of each, and let 
the impressions of one confirm those of another. Meas- 
ure, reckon, weigh, compare." 

Relative Importance of Play and of School Instruction. 
According to the present system, '"'The lessons which 



126 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

school-boys learn of each other in playing about their 
bounds, are a hundred times more useful to them than 
all those which the master teaches in the school." 

He also suggests experiments in the dark, which will 
both train the senses and get over the child^s dread of 
darkness. 

Pronunciation and Declamation. Emile, living in the 
country and being much in the open air, Avill acquire a 
distinct and emphatic way of speaking. He will also 
avoid a fruitful source of bad pronunciation among the 
children of the rich, viz., saying lessons by heart. These 
lessons the children gabble when they are learning them, 
and afterward, in their efforts to remember the words, 
they drawl and give all kinds of false emphasis. Decla- 
mation is to be shunned as acting. If Emile does not un- 
derstand anything, he will be too wise to pretend to 
understand it. 

On Music and Drawing. Rousseau seems perhaps in- 
consistent in not excluding music and drawing from his 
curriculum of ignorance : but as a musician, he natu- 
rally relaxed toward the former; and drawing he would 
have his pupil cultivate, not for the sake of the art itself, 
but only to give him a good eye and supple hand. He 
should, in all cases, draw from the objects themselves, 
" my intention being, not so much that he should know 
how to imitate the objects, as to become fully acquainted 
with them." 

Rousseau's Opinion of Ordinary School Instruction. 
The instruction given to ordinary school-boys, was of 
course an abomination in the eyes of Rousseau. " All 
the studies imposed on these poor unfortunates tend to 



ROUSSEAU'S ''£MILEr 12/ 

such objects as are entirely foreign to their minds. 
Judge, then, of the attention they are likely to bestow 
on them/'' "The pedagogues, who make a great parade 
of the instructions they give their scholars, are paid to 
talk in a different strain : one may see plainly, however, 
by their conduct, that they are exactly of my opinion : 
for, after all, what is it they teach them ? Words, still 
words, and nothing but words. Among the various sci- 
ences they pretend to teach, they take particular care 
not to fall upon those which are really useful; because 
there would be the sciences of things, and in them they 
would never succeed ; but they fix on such as appear to 
be understood when their terms are once gotten by rote, 
viz., geography, chronology, heraldry, the languages, 
etc., all studies so foreign to the purposes of man, 
and particularly to those of a child, that it is a wonder 
if ever he may have occasion for them as long as he 
lives." "la any study whatever, unless we possess the 
ideas of the things represented, the signs representing 
them are of no use or consequence. A child is, never- 
theless, always confined to these signs, without our be- 
ing capable of making him comprehend any of the 
things which they represent." What is the world to a 
child? It is a globe of pasteboard.'* "As nescience 
consists in the knowledge of words, so there is no study 

* Rousseau, like his pupil Basedow, would avoid the use even of 
representations, where possible. " It ought to be laid down as a 
general rule, never to substitute the shadow unless where it is 
impossible to exhibit the substance; for the representation en- 
grossing the attention of the child, generally makes him forget 
the object represented. 



128 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

proper for children. As they have no certain ideas, so 
they have no real memory ; for I do not call that so 
which is retentive only of mere sensations through sub- 
jects taught. What signifies imprinting on their minds 
a catalogue of signs which to them represent nothing ? 
Is it to be feared that, in acquiring the knowledge of 
things, they will not acquire also that of signs ? Why, 
then, shall we put them to the unnecessary trouble of 
learning them twice ? And yet what dangerous preju- 
dices do we not begin to instill, by making them take 
for knowledge, words which to them are without mean- 
ing ? In the very first unintelligible sentence with which 
a child sits down satisfied, in the very first thing he 
takes upon trust, or learns from others without being 
himself convinced of its utility, he loses part of his un- 
derstanding ; and he may figure long in the eyes of fools 
before he will be able to repair so considerable a loss. 
No; if nature has given to the child's brain that pliabil- 
ity which renders it fit to receive all impressions, it is 
not with a view that we should imprint thereon the 
names of kings, dates, terms of heraldry, of astronomy, 
of geography, and all those words, meaningless at his 
age, and useless at any age, with which we weary his sad 
and sterile childhood ; but that all the ideas which he can 
conceive, and which are useful to him, all those which 
relate to his happiness, and will one day make his duty 
plain to him, may trace themselves there in characters 
never to be effaced, and may assist him in conducting 
himself through life in a manner appropriate to his na- 
ture and his faculties." 



ROUSSEAU'S ''£mile:' 129 

Children's Memories may be Trained without Books. 

"That kind of memory which is possessed by children, 
may be fully employed without setting them to study 
books. Everything they see, or hear, appears striking, 
and they commit it to memory. A child keeps in his 
mind a register of the actions and conversation of those 
who are about him ; every scene he is engaged in is a 
book from which he insensibly enriches his memory, 
treasuring up his store till time shall ripen his judgment 
and turn it to profit. In the choice of these scenes and 
objects, in the care of presenting those constantly to his 
view which he ought to be familiar with, and in hiding 
from him such as are improper, consists the true art of 
cultivating this primary faculty of a child. By such 
means, also, it is, that we should endeavor to form that 
magazine of knowledge which should serve for his edu- 
cation in youth, and to regulate his conduct afterward. 
This method, it is true, is not productive of little prodi- 
gies of learning, nor does it tend to the glorification of 
the governess or preceptor: but it is the way to form 
robust and judicious men, persons sound in body and 
mind, who, without being admired while children, know 
how to make themselves respected when grown up." 

How Reading and Writing are to be Taught. As for 
reading and writing, if you can induce a desire for them, 
the child will be sure to learn them. "I am almost 
certain that Emile will know perfectly well how to read 
and write before he is ten years old, because I give my- 
self very little trouble whether he learn it or not before 
he is fifteen ; but I had much rather he should never 
learn to read at all, than to acquire that knowledge at 



I30 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

the expense of everything that would render it useful to 
him ; and of what service will the power of reading be 
to him when he has renounced its use forever ? ' Id in 
primis cavero opportebit, ne studia, qui amare nondum 
poterit, oderit, et amaritudinem semel perceptam etiam 
ultra rudes annos ref ormidet/ " 

Attention to be Fixed on what is Near. The following 
passage is perhaps familiar to Mr. Lowe: "If, proceed- 
ing on the plan I have begun to delineate, you follow 
rules directly contrary to those which are generally re- 
ceived ; if, instead of transporting your pupil's mind to 
what is remote — if, instead of making his thoughts wander 
unceasingly in other places, in other climates, in other 
centuries, to the ends of the earth, and to the very 
heavens, you apply yourself to keeping him always at 
home and attentive to that which comes in immediate 
contact with him, you will then find him capable of per- 
ception, of memory, and even of reason : this is the order 
of nature. In proportion as the sensitive becomes an 
active being, he acquires a discernment proportional to 
his bodily powers ; when he possesses more of the latter, 
also, than are necessary for his preservation, it is with 
that redundancy, and not before, that he displays those 
speculative faculties which are adapted to the employ- 
ment of such abilities to other purposes. Are you de- 
sirous, therefore, to cultivate the understanding of your 
pupil ? cultivate those abilities on which it depends. 
Keep him in constant exercise of body ; bring him up 
robust and healthy, in order to m.ake him reasonable and 
wise ; let him work, let him run about, let liim make a 
noise, in a word, let him be always active and in motion; 



ROUSSEAU'S '*£mile:' 131 

let him be once a man in vigor, and he will soon be a 
man in understanding." 

Rousseau on Moral Education. Let us now examine 
what provision was made, in Rousseau's system, for 
teaching the one science for children, that of moral be- 
havior (des devoirs de Vhomme), His notions of this 
science were by no means those to which we are ac- 
customed. As a believer in the goodness of human na- 
ture, he traced all folly, vanity, and vice to ordinary 
education, and he would therefore depart as widely as 
possible from the usual course. *^ Examine the rules of 
the common method of education," lie writes, "and you 
will find them all wrong, particularly those which relate 
to virtue and manners." 

Avoid doing Injuries. A simple alteration of method, 
however, would not suffice. Eousseau went further than 
this. He discarded all received notions, and set up one 
of his own in their stead. '' The only lesson of morality 
proper for children, and the most important to persons 
of all ages, is never to do an injury to any one. Even 
the positive precept of doing good, if not made subordi- 
nate to this, is dangerous, false, and contradictory." 

Who is the Good Man ? " Who is there that does not do 
good ? All the world does good, the wicked man as well 
as others : he makes one person happy at the expense of 
making a hundred miserable; hence arise all our calam- 
ities. The most sublime virtues are negative, they are 
also the most difficult to put in practice, because they 
are attended with no ostentation, and are even above the 
pleasure, so sweet to the heart of man, of sending away 
others satisfied with our benevolence. how much 



132 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

good must that man necessarily do his fellow-creatures, 
if such a man there be, who never did any of them harm I 
"What intrepidity of soul, what constancy of mind are 
necessary here ! It is not, however, by reasoning on this 
maxim, but by endeavoring to put it in practice, that all 
its difficulty is to be discovered." " The precept of never 
doing another harm, implies that of having as little to 
do as possible with human society; for in the social state 
the good of one man necessarily becomes the evil of an- 
other. This relation is essential to the thing itself, and 
can not be changed. We may inquire, on this principle, 
which is best, man in a state of society or in a state of 
solitude?" ^^A certain noble author has said, none but 
a wicked man might exist alone: for my part, I say, none 
but a good man might exist alone." 

E.ousseau and Robinson Crusoe. This passage fully 
explains Rousseau^s enthusiasm for Eobinson Crusoe, for 
he must have regarded him as the best and most bene- 
ficent of mortals. '* Happy are the people among whom 
goodness requires no self-denial, and men may be just 
without virtue." And the fortunate solitary had one- 
half of goodness ready made for him. " That which 
renders man essentially good, is to have few wants, and 
seldom to compare himself with others ; that which, 
renders him essentially wicked, is to have many wants, 
and to be frequently governed by opinion." Rousseau, 
however, did not vaunt the merits of negation with abso- 
lute consistency. Elsewhere he says, ^'^He who wants 
nothing will love nothing, and I can not conceive that he 
who loves nothing can be happy." 

Liberty a la Rousseau. As Rousseau found the root of 



liOUSSEAU'S "EMILE." 133- 

all evil in the action of man upon man, lie sought to dis- 
sever his child of nature as much as possible from his 
fellow-creatures, and to assimilate him to Robinson Cru- 
soe. Anything like rule and obedience was abomination 
to Rousseau, and he confounds the wise rule of superior 
intelligence with the tyranny of mere caprice. He 
writes : " We always either do that which is pleasing to 
the child, or exact of him what pleases ourselves ; either 
submitting to his humors or obliging him to submit to 
ours. There is no medium, he must either give orders 
or receive them. Hence the first ideas it acquires are 
those of absolute rule and servitude. The great panacea 
for all evils was, then, ^Miberty," by which Rousseau 
understood independence. ^^He only performs the 
actions of his own will, who stands in no need of the 
assistance of others to put his designs in execution : and 
hence it follows that the greatest of all blessings is not 
authority, but liberty. A man, truly free, wills only 
that which he can do, and does only that which pleases 
him. This is my fundamental maxim. It need only 
be applied to childhood, and all the rules of education 
will naturally flow from it." 

The Child to be his own Master, but in Appearance 
Only. " Whosoever does what he will is happy, provided 
he is capable of doing it himself ; this is the case with 
man in a state of nature." 

But a very obvious difficulty suggests itself. A child 
is necessarily the most dependent creature in the world. 
How, then, can he be brought up in what Rousseau calls 
liberty ? Rousseau sees this difficulty, and all he can say 
is, that as real liberty is impossible for a child, you must 



134 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

give him sliam liberty instead. " Let him always be his- 
own master in appearance, and do you take care to be 
so in reality. There is no subjection so complete as that 
which preserves the appearance of liberty; it is by this 
means even the will itself is led captive. The poor child, 
who knows nothing, who is capable of nothing, is surely 
sufficiently at your mercy. Don't you dispose, with re- 
gard to him, of everything about him ? Are not you 
capable of affecting him just as you please ? His em- 
ployment, his sports, his pleasures, his pains, are they 
not all in your power, without his knowing it ? Assur- 
edly, he ought not to be compelled to do anything con- 
trary to his inclinations ; but then he ought not to be 
inclined to do anything contrary to yours : he ought not 
to take a step which you had not foreseen ; nor open his 
lips to speak without your knowing what he is about to 
say. When you have once brought him under such 
regulations, you may indulge him freely in all those cor- 
poreal exercises which his age requires, without running 
the hazard of blunting his intellects. You will then see, 
that instead of employing all his subtle arts to shake off 
a burdensome and disagreeable tyranny, he will be busied 
only in making the best use of everything about him. It 
is in this case you will have reason to be surprised at the 
subtility of his invention, and the ingenuity with which 
he makes everything that is in his power contribute to 
his gratification, without being obliged to prepossession 
or opinion. In thus leaving him at liberty to follow his 
own will, you will not augment his caprice. By being 
accustomed only to do that which is proper for his state 
and condition he will soon do nothing but what h& 



ROUSSEAU'S '' EMILEr 135 

ought ; and though he should be in continual motion of 
body, yet, while he is employed only in the pursuit of 
his present and apparent interest, you will find his rea- 
soning faculties display themselves better, and in a 
manner more peculiar to himself, than if he was engaged 
in studies of pure speculation." 

Children must Learn to Suffer. After this astonish- 
ing passage, the reader will probably consider Eousseau's 
opinions of moral behavior mere matters of curiosity. 
Yet some of his advice is well worth considering. 

Although children should be made happy, they should 
by no means be shielded from every possible hurt. " The 
first thing we ought to learn, and that which it is of the 
greatest consequence for us to know, is to suffer. It 
seems as if children were formed little and feeble to 
learn this important lesson without danger." "Exces- 
sive severity, as well as excessive indulgence, should be 
equally avoided. If you leave children to suffer, you 
expose their health, endanger their lives, and make them 
actually miserable; on the other hand, if you are too 
anxious to prevent their being sensible of any kind of 
pain and inconvenience, you only pave their way to 
feel much greater ; you enervate their constitutions, 
make them tender and effeminate ; in a word, you re- 
move them out of their situation as human beings, into 
which they must hereafter return in spite of all your 
solicitude." 

Importance of Firmness. His advice on firmness is 
also good. '^When the child desires what is necessary, 
you ought to know and immediately comply with its re- 
quest : but to be induced to do anything by its tears, is 



136 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

to encourage it to cry; it is to teacli it to doubt your 
good-will, and to think you are influenced more by im- 
portunity than benevolence. Beware of this, for if your 
child once comes to imagine you are not of a good disposi- 
tion, he will soon be of a bad one ; if he once thinks you 
complain, he will soon grow obstinate. You should com- 
ply with his request immediately if you do not intend 
to refuse it. Mortify him not with frequent denials, but 
never revoke a refusal once made him." Caprice, whether 
of the governor or of the child, is carefully to be 
shunned. 

Children have an Innate Sense of Right and Wrong. 
"^ There is an innate sense of right and wrong implanted 
in the human heart." In proof of this, he gives an an- 
ecdote of an infant who almost screamed to death on 
receiving a blow from the nurse. ^^ I am very certain," 
he says, ^^had a burning coal fallen by accident on the 
hand of the child, it would have been less agitated than 
by this slight blow, given with a manifest intention to 
hurt it." 

natural Punishments. For punishments he gives a 
hint which has been worked out by Mr. H. Spencer. 
" Oppose to his indiscreet desires only physical obstacles, 
or tlie inconveniences naturally arising from the actions 
themselves; these he will remember on a future oc- 
casion." 

Some Measure of Liberty Desirable. Even in the 
matter of liberty, about which no one disagrees more 
heartily with Rousseau than I do, we may, I think, learn 
a lesson from him. " Emile acts from his own thoughts, 
and not from the dictation of others." '^If your head 



ROUSSEAU'S ''EMILEr 13/ 

always directs your pupiFs hands, his own head will be- 
come useless to him." There is a great truth in this. 
While differing so far from Rousseau, that I should re- 
quire the most implicit obedience from boys, I feel that 
we must give them a certain amount of independent 
action and freedom from restraint, as a means of edu- 
cation. In many of our private schools, a boy is hardly 
called upon to exercise his will all daylong. He rises in 
the morning when he must; at meals, he eats till he is 
obliged to stop; he is taken out for exercise like a horse; 
he has all his indoor work prescribed for him, both as to 
time and quantity. As Montaigne quotes from Seneca, 
^^ nunquam tutelae suae fiunt." (They never become their 
own guardians.) Thus a boy grows up without having 
any occasion to think or act for himself. He is there- 
fore without self-reliance. So much care is taken to 
prevent his doing wrong, that he gets to think only of 
checks from without. He is therefore incapable of self- 
restraint. Our public schools give more "liberty," and 
turn out better men. 

The Change at Twelve Years. We will now suppose 
the child to have reached the age of twelve, a proficient 
in ignorance. His education must, at this period, alter 
entirely. The age for learning has arrived. ''Give me 
a child of twelve years of age who knows nothing at all, 
and at fifteen I will return him to you as learned as any 
that you may have instructed earlier; with this differ- 
ence, that the knowledge of yours will be only in his 
memory, and that of mine will be in his judgment." 
''To what use is it proper a child should put that re- 
dundancy of abilities, of which he is at present pos- 



138 £SSAyS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

sessed, and which will fail him at another age ? He should 
employ it on those things which may be of utility in 
time to come. He should throw, if I may so express 
myself, the superfluity of his present being into the 
future. The robust child should provide for the sub- 
sistence of the feeble man ; not in laying up his treasure 
in coffers whence thieves may steal, nor by intrusting it 
to the hands of others ; but by keeping it in his own. To 
appropriate his acquisitions to himself he will secure 
them in the strength and dexterity of his own arms, and 
in the capacity of his own head. This, therefore, is the 
time for employment, for instruction, for study. Ob- 
serve, also, that I have not arbitrarily fixed on this 
period for that purpose : nature itself plainly points it 
out to us." 

Education of Emile Scientific not Literary. The edu- 
cation of Emile was to be, to use the language of the 
present day, scientific, not literary. Kousseau professed 
a hatred of books, which he said kept the student so 
long engaged upon the thoughts of other people as to 
have no time to make a store of his own. ^^The abuse 
of reading is destructive to knowledge. Imagining our- 
selves to know everything we read, we conceive it un- 
necessary to learn it by other means. Too much read- 
ing, however, serves only to make us presumptuous 
blockheads. Of all the ages in which literature has 
flourished, reading was never so universal as in the 
present, nor were men in general ever so ignorant." 

Science to be Studied with a View to Precise Ideas. 
Even science was to be studied, not so much with a view 
to knowledge, as to intellectual vigor. '^ You will re- 



ROUSSEAU'S "emile:' 139 

member it is my constant maxim, not to teach the boy 
a multiplicity of things, but to prevent his acquiring 
any but clear and precise ideas. His knowing nothing 
does not much concern me, provided he does not deceive 
himself." 

The Cultivation of the Judgment. Again he says: 
" Emile has but little knowledge ; but what he has is 
truly his own ; he knows nothing by halves. Among 
the few things he knows, and knows well, the most im- 
portant is, that there are many things which he is now 
ignorant of, and which he may one day know; that 
there are many more which some men know and he 
never will ; and that there is an infinity of others which 
neither he nor anybody else will ever know. He pos- 
sesses a universal capacity, not in point of actual knowl- 
edge, but in the faculty of acquiring it ; an open, intel- 
ligent genius, adapted to everything, and, as Montaigne 
says, if not instructed, capable of receiving instruction. 
It is sufficient for me that he knows how to discover the 
utility of his actions, and the reason for his opinions. 
Once again, I say, my object is not to furnish his mind 
with knowledge, but to teach him the method of acquir- 
ing it when he has occasion for it ; to instruct him how 
to hold it in estimation, and to inspire him, above all, 
with a love for truth. By this method, indeed, we make 
no great advances ; but then we never take a useless 
step, nor are we obliged to turn back again." 

Method Aims at Development. The method of learn- 
ing, therefore, was to be chosen with the view of bring- 
ing out the pupil's powers : and the subjects of instruc- 
tion were to be sufficiently varied to give the pupil a 



140 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

notion of the connection between various branches of 
knowledge, and to ascertain the direction in which his 
taste and talent would lead him. 

Cultivate a Desire for Knowledge. The first thing to 
be aimed at is exciting a desire for knowledge. ^^ Direct 
the attention of your pupil to the phenomena of nature, 
and you will soon awaken his curiosity ; but to keep that 
curiosity alive, you must be in no haste to satisfy it. 
Put questions to him adapted to his capacity, and leave 
him to resolve them. He is not to know anything be- 
cause you have told it to him, but because he has him- 
self comprehended it : he shoidd not learn, but discover, 
science. If ever you substitute authority in the place of 
argument, he will reason no longer ; he will be ever 
after bandied like a shuttlecock between the opinions of 
others.'^ Curiosity, when aroused, should be fostered 
by suspense, and the tutor must, above all things^ avoid 
what Mr. Wilson, of Rugby, has lately called ^' didactic 
teaching.'^ "I do not at all admire explanatory dis- 
courses,^^ says Rousseau ; "'young people give little at- 
tention to them, and never retain them in memory. 
The things themselves are the best explanations. I can 
never enough repeat it, that we make words of too much 
consequence ; with our prating modes of education we 
make nothing but praters." 

Grandest Result is Self-teaching. The grand thing to 
be educed, was self-teacliing. " Obliged to learn of him- 
self, the pupil makes use of his own reason, and not of 
that of others ; for to give no influence to opinion, no 
weight should be given to authority ; and it is certain 
that our errors arise less from ourselves than from others. 



ROUSSEAU'S ''£mile:' 141 

From this continual exercise of the understanding will 
result a vigor of mind, like that which we give the body 
by labor and fatigue. Another advantage is, that we 
advance only in proportion to our strength. The mind, 
like the body, carries that only which it can carry. But 
tvhen the understanding appropriates everything before 
it commits it to the memory, whatever it afterward 
draws from thence is properly its own ; whereas, in over- 
charging the mind without the knowledge of the under- 
standing, we expose ourselves to the inconvenience of 
never drawing out anything which belongs to us." 

Importance of Self-activity. Again he writes: '^Wq 
acquire, without doubt, notions more clear and certain 
of things we thus learn of ourselves, than of those we 
are taught by others. Another advantage also resulting 
from this method is, that we do not accustom ourselves 
to a servile submission to the authority of others; but, 
by exercising our reason, grow every day more ingenious 
in the discovery of the relations of things, in connect- 
ing our ideas and in the contrivance of machines; where- 
as, by adopting those which are put into our hands, our 
invention grows dull and indifferent, as the man who 
never dresses himself, but is served in everything by his 
servants, and drawn about everywhere by his horses, 
loses by degrees the activity and use of his limbs. Boil- 
eau boasted that he had taught Racine to rhyme with 
difficulty. Among the many admirable methods taken 
to abridge the study of the sciences, we are in great 
want of one to make us learn them with effort" 

The Model Pupil Must Learn a Trade. Followmg 
in the steps of Locke, Rousseau required his model pupil 



142 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

to learn a trade. But this was not to be acquired as a 
mere amusement. First, Kousseau required it to secure 
the self-dependence of his pupil, and secondly, to im- 
prove his head, as well as his hands. '' If, instead of 
keeping a boy poring over books, I employ him in a 
workshop, his hands will be busied to the improvement 
of his understanding; he will become a philosopher, 
while he thinks himself only an artisan.^' 

Rousseau at one time Popular. I hope the quotations 
I have now given, will suffice to convey to the reader 
some of Rousseau's main ideas on the subject of educa- 
tion. The " Emile " was once a popular book in this 
country. In David Williams' Lectures (dated 1789) we 
read, ^' Rousseau is in full possession of public attention. 
... To be heard on the subject of education it is 
expedient to direct our observations to his works." But 
now the case is different. In the words of Mr. Herman 
Merivale, "Rousseau was dethroned with the fall of his 
extravagant child the Republic." Perhaps we have been 
less influenced by both father and child than any nation 
of Europe ; and if so, we owe this to our horror of ex- 
travagance. The English intellect is eminently deco- 
rous,* and Rousseau's disregard for "appearances," or 
rather his evident purpose of making an impression by 
defying "appearances" and saying jnst the opposite of 
what is expected, simply distresses it. Hence the 
"Emile " has long ceased to be read in this country, and 
the only English translation I have met with was pub- 

*How is it that we have so many of us taken to making obser- 
vations on tlie English miod, as if we were as external to it as 
the Japanese jugglers? Do we (^we this to Matthew Arnold? 



ROUSSEAU'S '' £mile:' 143 

lished in the last century, and has not been reprinted. 
So Rousseau now works upon us only through his disciples, 
especially Pestalozzi ; but the reader will see from the 
passages I have selected, that we have often listened to 
Rousseau unawares. 

The Most Important Truth of the "Emile"— The Distinc- 
tion between Childhood and Youth. The truths of the 
*' Emile " will survive the fantastic forms which are there 
forced upon them. Of these truths, one of the most 
important, to my mind, is the distinction drawn between 
childhood and youth. I do not, of course, insist with 
Rousseau, that a child should be taught nothing till the 
day on which he is twelve years old, and then that in- 
struction should begin all at once. There is no hard 
and fast line that can be drawn between the two stages 
of development : the change from one to the other is 
gradual, and in point of time differs greatly with the in- 
dividual. But as I have elsewhere said, I believe the 
difference between the child and the youth to be greater 
than the difference between the youth and the man ; and 
I believe further, that this is far too much overlooked in 
our ordinary education. Rousseau, by drawing attention 
to the sleep of reason and to the activity and vigor of 
the senses in childhood, became one of the most im- 
portant educational reformers, and a benefactor of 
mankind.* 

* This teaching of Rousseau's seems especially deserving of our 
consideration now that it has been proposed to elect boys of thir- 
teen to Christ's Hospital, and to scholarships in other schools, by 
competitive examination. Whatever advantages may have re- 
sulted from such competition in the case of older pupils, we can 



144 £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 



VI. 

BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 

Life of Basedow. One of the most famous movements 
ever made in educational reform was started in the last 
century by John Bernard Basedow. Basedow was born 
at Hamburg in 1723, the son of a wigmaker. His early 
years were not spent in the ordinary happiness of child- 
hood. His mother he describes as melancholy, almost 
to madness, and his father was severe almost to brutality.. 
It was the father^s intention to bring up his son to his 
own business, but the lad ran away, and engaged himself 
as servant to a gentleman in Holstein. The master soon 
perceived what had never occurred to the father, viz.,. 
that the youth had very extraordinary abilities. Sent^ 
home with a letter from his master pointing out this 

not fairly assume that the system ought to be extended to chil- 
dren. Examinations can not test the proper development of 
children, or mark out the cleverest. Indeed, what they would 
really decide for us would be, not which were the cleverest chil- 
dren, but which had been intrusted to the cleverest " crammers." 
Thus the master would be stimulated to "ply the memory and 
load the brain " for their livelihood ; and a race of precocious 
children terminating their intellectual career at the point where 
it ought to begin, would convince us of the wisdom of Rousseau, 
and drive us back to the neglected arts of being ignorant and 
losing time. See Mr. Arnold's vigorous protest against ex- 
aminations of children. — Schools and Universities of the Continent, 
chap, v., pp. 60, 61. 



BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 1 45 

notable discovery, Basedow was allowed to renounce the 
paternal calling, and to go to the Hamburg Grammar 
School {Gymnasmm), where he was under Keimarus, 
the author of the '* Wolfenbiittel Fragment." In due 
course his friends managed to send him to the University 
of Leipzig to prepare himself for the least expensive of 
the learned professions — the clerical. Basedow, how- 
ever, was not a man to follow the beaten tracks. After 
an irregular life he left the university too unorthodox to 
think of being ordained, and in 1749 became private 
tutor to the children of Herr von Quaalen, in Holstein. 
In this situation his talent for inventing new methods of 
teaching first showed itself. He knew how to adapt 
himself to the capacity of the children, and he taught 
them much by conversation, and in the way of play, con- 
necting his instruction with surrounding objects in the 
house, garden, or fields. Through Quaalen's influence, 
he next obtained a professorship at Soroe, in Denmark, 
where he lectured for eight years, but his unorthodox 
writings raised a storm of opposition, and the Govern- 
ment finally removed him to the Gymnasium at Altona. 
Here he still continued his efforts to change the prevail- 
ing opinion in religious matters, and so great a stir was 
made by the publication of his " Philalethia," and his 
'^ Methodical Instruction in both Natural and Biblical 
Religion," that he and his family were refused the Com- 
munion at Altona, and his books were excluded, under a 
heavy penalty, from Liibeck. 

Influence of Rousseau on Basedow ; Need of Reform in 
Germany. About this time Basedow, incited by Rous- 
seau's " Emile," turned his attention to a fresh field of 



146 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

activity, in which he was to make as many friends as in 
theology he had found enemies. A very general dissatis- 
faction was then felt with the condition of the schools. 
Physical education was not attempted in them. The 
mother-tongue was neglected. Instruction in Latin and 
Greek, which was the only instruction given, was carried 
on in a mechanical way, without any thought of im- 
provement. The education of the poor and of the mid- 
dle classes received but little attention. " Youth," says 
Eaumer, '^ was in those days, for most children, a sadly 
harassed period. Instruction was hard and heartlessly 
severe. Grammar was caned into the memory, so were 
portions of Scripture and poetry. A common school 
punishment was to learn by heart Psalm cxix. School- 
rooms were dismally dark. No one conceived it possible 
that the young could find pleasure in any kind of 
work, or that they had eyes for aught besides reading 
and writing. The pernicious age of Louis XIV. had in- 
flicted on the poor children of the upper classes, hair 
curled by the barber and messed with powder and po- 
made, braided coats, knee breeches, silk stockings, and 
a dagger by the side — for active, lively children a perfect 
torture " (Geschichte der Pildagogik, ii. 297). Kant 
gave expression to a very wide-spread feeling when he 
said that what was wanted in education was no longer a 
reform but a revolution. 

Basedow the Prince of Innovators. Here, then, was a 
good scope offered for innovators, and Basedow was a 
prince of innovators. 

Having succeeded in interesting the Danish minister, 
Bernsdorf, in his plans, he was permitted to devote him- 



BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 1 4/ 

self entirely to a work on the subject of education whilst 
retaining his income from the Altona Gymnasium. The 
result was, his ^^ Address to the Philanthropists and Men 
of Property, on Schools and Studies, and their Influence 
on the Public Weal," in which he announces the plan of 
his "Elementary/^* In this address he calls upon 
princes, governments, town-councils, dignitaries of the 
Church, freemasons' lodges, etc., if they loved their 
fellow-creatures, to come to his assistance in bringing 
out his book. Nor did he call in vain. When the 
''^Elementary" at length appeared (in 1774), he had to 
acknowledge contributions from the emperor Joseph II., 
from Catherine II. of Eussia, from Christian VII. of 
Denmark, from the Grand Prince Paul, and many other 
celebrities, the total sum received being over 2,000?. 

Basedow and his Famous Friends. While Basedow 
was traveling about to get subscriptions, he spent some 
time in Frankfort, and thence made an excursion to 
Ems with two distinguished companions, one of them 
Lavater, and the other a young man of five-and-twenty, 
already celebrated as the author of "Gotz von Berlich- 
ingen," and the "Sorrows of Werther." Of Basedow's 
personal peculiarities at this time, Gothe has left us an 
amusing description in the " Wahrheit und Dichtung ;" 
but we must accept the portrait with caution: the sketch 
was thrown in as an artistic contrast with that of La- 
vater, and no doubt exaggerates those features in which 
the antithesis could be brought out with best effect. 

* I avail myself of the old substantival use of the word elemen- 
tary to express its German equivalent Elementarbuch. 



148 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

"One could not see," writes Gothe, "a more marked 
contrast than between Lavater and Basedow. As the 
lines of Lavater's countenance were free and open to the 
beholder, so were Basedow's contracted, and as it were 
drawn inward. Lavater's eye clear and benign, under a 
Ycry wide eyelid ; Basedow^ on the other hand, deep 
in his head, small, black, sharp, gleaming out from 
under shaggy eyebrows, whilst Lavater's frontal bone 
seemed bounded by two arches of the softest brown hair. 
Basedow's impetuous rough voice, his rapid and sharp 
utterances, a certain derisive laugh, an abrupt changing- 
of the topic of conversation, and whatever else distin- 
guished him, all were opposed to the peculiarities and 
the behavior by which Lavater had been making us over- 
fastidious.'' 

Goethe's Opinion of Basedow. Gothe approved of Base- 
dow's desire to make all instruction lively and natural, 
and thought that his system would promote mental 
activity and give the young a fresher view of the world : 
but he finds fault with the ^^ Elementary," and prefers 
the "Orbis Pictus" of Comenius, in which subjects are 
presented in their natural connection. Basedow him- 
self, says Gothe, was not a man either to edify or to lead 
other people. Although the object of his journey was 
to interest the public in his philanthropic enterprise, and 
to open not only hearts but purses, and he was able to 
speak eloquently and convincingly on the subject of 
education, he spoilt everything by his tirades against 
prevalent religious belief, especially on the subject of the 
Trinity. 

Basedow with Goethe. Gothe found in Basedow's 



BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 1 49 

society an opportunity of *' exercising, if not enlighten- 
ing/' his mind, so he bore with his personal peculiari- 
ties, though apparently with great difficulty. Basedow 
seems to have delighted in worrying his associates. 
^^He would never see any one quiet but he provoked 
him with mocking irony, in a hoarse voice, or put him to 
confusion by an unexpected question, and laughed bit- 
terly when he had gained his end ; yet he was pleased 
when the object of his jests was quick enough to collect 
himself, and answer in the same strain." So far Gothe 
was his match, but he was nearly routed by Basedow's 
use of bad tobacco, and of some tinder still worse with 
which he was constantly lighting his pipe and poisoning 
the air insufferably. He soon discovered Grothe's dislike 
to this preparation of his, so he took a malicious pleasure 
in using it and dilating upon its merits. 

Here is an odd account of their intercourse. During 
their stay at Ems, Gothe went a great deal into fashion- 
able society. " To make up for these dissipations," he 
writes, ^^\ always passed a part of the night with Base- 
dow. He never went to bed, but dictated without ces- 
sation. Occasionally he cast himself on the couch and 
slumbered, while his amanuensis sat quietly, pen in 
hand, ready to continue his work when the half-awak- 
ened author should once more give free course to his 
thoughts. All this took place in a close confined cham- 
ber, filled with the fumes of tobacco and the odious 
tinder. As often as I was disengaged from a dance I 
hastened up to Basedow, who was ready at once to 
speak and dispute on any question ; and when after a 
time I hurried again to the ball-room, before I had 



ISO ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

closed the door behind me he would resume the thread 
of his essay as composedly as if he had been engaged 
with nothing else/^ 

The Philanthropin Founded at Dessau. It was through 
a friend of Gothe\ Behrisch, whose acquaintance we 
make in the '^Wahrheit und Dictung," that Basedow 
became connected with Prince Leopold of Dessau. 
Behrisch was tutor to the Prince's son, and by him the 
Prince was so interested in Basedow's plans that he de- 
termined to found an Institute in which they should be 
realized. Basedow was therefore called to Dessau, and 
under his direction was opened the famous Philanthro- 
pin. Then for the first, and probably for the last time, 
a school was started in which use and wont were entirely 
set aside, and everything done on '^improved principles.'' 
Such a bold enterprise attracted the attention of all in- 
terested in education, far and near : but it would seem 
that few parents considered their own children vilia cor- 
pora (vile bodies) on whom experiments might be made 
for the public good. When, in May, 1776, a number of 
schoolmasters and others collected from different parts of 
Germany, and even from beyond Germany, to be present 
by Basedow's invitation at an examination of the children, 
they found only thirteen pupils in the Philanthropin, 
including Basedow's own son and daughter. 

The "Elementary" and the Book of Method. Before 
we investigate how Basedow's principles were embodied 
in the Philanthropin, let us see the form in which he 
had already announced them. The great work from 
which all children were to be taught was the '^ Ele- 
mentary." As a companion to this was published the 



BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 15T 

**Book of Method'^ {Methodenhuch) for parents and 
teachers. The ''^ Elementary" is a work in which a 
great deal of information about things in general is 
given in the form of a dialogue, interspersed with tales 
and easy poetry. Except in bulk, it does not seem to 
me to differ very materially from many of the reading 
books which, in late years, have been published in this 
country. It had the advantage, however, of being ac- 
companied by a set of engravings to which the text re- 
ferred, though they were too large to be bound up with 
it. The root-ideas of Basedow put forth in his ^' Book 
of Method," and other writings, are those of Rousseau. 
For example, ^^You should attend to nature in your 
children far more than to art. The elegant manners 
and usages of the world are for the most part unnatural 
{Unnatur). These come of themselves in later years. 
Treat children like children, that they may remain the 
longer uncorrupted. A boy whose acutest faculties are 
his senses, and who has no perception of anything ab- 
stract, must first of all be made acquainted with the 
world as it presents itself to the senses. Let this be 
shown him in nature itself, or where this is impossible, 
in faithful drawings or models. Thereby can he, even 
in play, learn how the various objects are to be named. 
Comenius alone has pointed out the right road in this 
matter. By all means reduce the wretched exercises of 
the memory/' 

Application of the Method. Elsewhere he gives in- 
stances of the sort of things to which this method should 
be applied. 1st. Man. Here he would use the pictures 
of foreigners and wild men, also a skeleton, a hand in 



152 ESSAYS OM EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

spirits^ and other objects still more appropriate to a sur- 
gical museum. 2d. Animals. Only such animals are 
to be depicted as it is useful to know about, because 
there is much that ought to be known, and a good 
method of instruction must shorten rather than increase 
the hours of study. Articles of commerce made from 
the animals may also be exhibited. 3d. Trees and plants. 
Only the most important are to be selected. Of these 
the seeds also must be shown, and cubes formed of the 
different woods. Gardeners' and farmers' implements 
are to be explained. 4th. Minerals and chemical sub- 
stances. 5th. Mathematical instruments for weighing 
and measuring ; also the air-pump, siphon, and the like. 
The form and motion of the earth are to be explained 
with globes and maps. 6th. Trades. The use of vari- 
ous tools is to be taught. 7th. History. This is to be 
illustrated by engravings of historical events. 8th. 
Commerce. Samples of commodities may be produced. 
9th. The younger children should be shown pictures of 
familiar objects about the house and its surroundings. 

Mistake in Supposing so many Subjects could be 
Taught. We see from this list that Basedow contem- 
plated giving his educational course the charm of va- 
riety. Indeed, with that candor in acknowledging mis- 
takes which partly makes amends for the effrontery too 
common in the trumpetings of his own performances, 
past, present, and to come, he confesses that when he 
began the "Elementary" he had exaggerated notions 
of the amount boys were capable of learning, and that 
he had subsequently very much contracted his proposed 
curriculum. And even " The Revolution, '^ which was 



BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 153 

to introduce so much new learning into the schools, 
could not afford entirely to neglect the old. However 
pleased parents might be with the novel acquirements of 
their children, they were not likely to be satisfied with- 
out the usual knowledge of Latin, and still less would 
they tolerate the neglect of French, which, in German 
polite society of the eighteenth century, was the recog- 
nized substitute for the vulgar tongue. These, then, 
must be taught. But the old methods might be aban- 
doned, if not the old subjects. 

French and Latin to be Taught by Conversation. 
Basedow proposed to teach both French and Latin by 
conversation. Let a cabinet of models, or something 
of the kind, be shown the children; let them learn the 
names of the different objects in Latin or French; then 
let questions be asked in those languages, and the right 
answers at first put into the children's mouths. When 
they have in this way acquired some knowledge of the 
language, they may apply it to the translating of an 
easy book. Basedow does not claim originality for the 
conversational method. He appeals to the success with 
which it had been already used in teaching French. 
^'Are the French governesses,^' he asks, **who, without 
vocabularies and grammars, first by conversation, then 
by reading, teach their language very successfully and 
very rapidly in schools of from thirty to forty chil- 
dren, better teachers than most masters in our Latin 
schools?'' 

On the subject of religion the instruction was to be 
quite as original as in matters of less importance. The 
teachers were to give an impartial account of all relig- 



154 JSSSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

ions, and nothing but "natural religion ^^ was to be^ 
inculcated. 

Everything According to Nature. The key-note of 
the whole system was to be — every tiling according to na- 
ture. The natural desires and inclinations of the chil- 
dren were to be educated and directed aright, but in no 
case to be suppressed. 

These, then, were the principles and the methods 
which, as Basedow believed, were to revolutionize edu- 
cation through the success of the Philanthropin. Base- 
dow himself, as we might infer from Gothe's descrip^ 
tion of him, was by no means a model director for the 
model Institution, but he was fortunate in his assistants. 
Of these he had three at the time of the public exami- 
nation, of whom Wolke is said to have been the ablest. 

A lively description of the examination was afterward 
published by Herr Schummel of Magdeburg, under the 
title of "Fred's Journey to Dessau. "" It purports to 
be written by a boy of twelve years old, and to describe 
what took place without attempting criticism. A few 
extracts will give us a notion of the instruction carried 
on in the Philanthropin, 

A Visit to the Philanthropin; the Public Examina- 
tion. "I have just come from a visit with my father to 
the Philanthropin, where I saw Herr Basedow, Herr 
Wolke, Herr Simon, Herr Schweighauser, and the lit- 
tle Philanthropinists. I am delighted with all that I 
have seen, and hardly know where to begin my descrip- 
tion of it. There are two large white houses, and near 
them a field with trees. A pupil — not one of the regu- 
lar scholars, but of those they call Pamulants [a poorer 



BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIC. 1 5$ 

class, who were servitors] — received us at tlie door, and 
asked if we wished to see Herr Basedow. We said 
* Yes,^ and he took us into the other house, where we 
found Herr Basedow in a dressing-gown, writing at a 
desk. We came at an inconvenient time, and Herr 
Basedow said he was very busy. He was very friendly, 
however, and promised to visit us in the evening. ' We 
then went into the other house, and inquired for Herr 
Wolke.^^ By him they were taken to the scholars. 
"They have,"' says Fred, "their hair cut very short, 
and no wig-maker is employed. Their throats are quite 
open, and their shirt-collar falls back over their coats."* 
Further on he describes the examination. " The little 
ones have gone through the oddest performances. They 
play at ^word-of -command." Eight or ten stand in a 
line like soldiers, and Herr Wolke is officer. He gives 
the word in Latin, and they must do whatever he says. 
For instance, when he says Claudite oculos (shut your 
eyes), they all shut their eyes; when he says Circnm- 
spicite (look around), they look about them; Imitam- 
mi sartorem (imitate the tailor), they all sew like 
tailors ; Imitainini sutorem (imitate the cobbler), they 
draw the waxed thread like the cobblers. Herr Wolke 
gives a thousand different commands in the drollest 
fashion. Another game, ' the hiding game,' I will also 
teach you. Some one writes a name, and hides it from 
the children — the name of some part of the body, or of 
a plant, or animal, or metal — and the children guess 
what it is. Whoever guesses right gets an apple or a 
piece of cake. One of the visitors wrote Lifestina, and 
told the children it was a part of the body. Then the 



156 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

guessing began. One guessed caput (head), another 
nasus (nose), anothor os (mouth), another manus, 
(hand), pes (foot), digiti (fingers), jpectus (breast), and 
so forth, for a long time; but one of them hit it at last. 
Next, Herr Wolke wrote the name of a beast, a quad- 
ruped. Then came the guesses: leo, iirsuSy camehcs, 
elephas, and so on, till one guessed right — it was 7mis 
(mouse). Then a town was written, and they guessed 
Lisbon, Madrid, Paris, London, till a child won with 
St. Petersburg. They had another game, which was 
this: Herr Wolke gave the command in Latin, and they 
imitated the noises of different animals, and made us 
laugh till we were tired. They roared like lions, crowed 
like cocks, mewed like cats, just as they were bid." 

The subject that was next handled had also the effect 
of making the strangers laugh, till a severe reproof from 
Herr Wolke restored their gravity. A picture was 
brought, in which was represented a sad-looking wom- 
an, whose person indicated the approaching arrival of 
another subject for education. From one part of the 
picture it also appeared that the prospective mother, 
with a prodigality of forethought, had got ready cloth- 
ing for both a boy and a girl. After a warning from 
Herr Wolke, that this was a most serious and important 
subject, the children were questioned on the topics the 
picture suggested. They were further taught the debt 
of gratitude they owed to their mothers, and the Ger- 
man fiction about the stork dismissed with due con- 
tempt. 

Next came the examination in arithmetic. Here 
there seems to have been nothing remarkable, except 



BASEDOW AND THE PIIILANTHROPIN. 15/ 

that all the rules were worked viva voce. From the 
arithmetic Herr Wolke went on to an '^Attempt at 
various small drawings/^ He asked the children what 
he should draw. Some one answered leonem. He then 
pretended he was drawing a lion, but put a beak to it; 
whereupon the children shouted Non est leo — leones non 
liabent rostrum! (That isn't a lion! Lions have no 
beaks!) He went on to other subjects, as the children 
directed him, sometimes going wrong that the children 
might put him right.* In the next exercise dice were 
introduced, and the children threw to see who should 
give an account of an engraving. The engravings rep- 
resented workmen at their different trades, and the child 
had to explain the process, the tools, etc. A lesson on 
plowing and harrowing was given in French, and an- 
other, on Alexander's expedition to India, in Latin. 
Four of the pupils translated passages from Ourtius and 
from Castellion's Bible, which were read to them. 
^^ These children,'' said the teacher, '^ knew not a word 
of Latin a year ago." '*^The listeners were well pleased 
with the Latin," writes Fred, ''^ except two or three, 
whom I heard grumbling that this was all child's play, 
and that if Cicero, Livy, and Horace were introduced, it 
would soon be seen what was the value of Philanthropin- 
ist Latin." After the examination, two comedies were 
acted by the children, one in French, the other in Ger- 
man. 

* As an amusing specimen of the taste of the time, I may men- 
tion that when in drawing a house Herr Wolke put the door not 
quite in the middle, the children insisted on having another door 
to correspond propter symmetriam (on account of symmetry). 



158 £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Favorable Impression Left by the Philanthropin. 

Most of the strangers seem to have left Dessau with a 
favorable impression of the Philanthropin. They were 
especially struck with the brightness and animation of 
the children. 

The Philanthropin a good Infant School. How far 
did the Philanthropin really deserve their good opinion? 
The conclusion to which we are driven by Fred's narra- 
tive is, that Basedow carried to excess his principle — 
" treat children as children, that they may remain the 
longer uncorrupted;" and that the Philanthropin was, 
in fact, nothing but a good infant-school. Surely none 
of the thirteen children who were the subjects of Base- 
dow's experiments could have been more than ten years 
old. But if we consider Basedow's system to have been 
intended for children, say between the ages of six and 
ten, we must allow that it possessed great merits. At 
the very beginning of a boy's learning, it has always been 
too much the custom to make him hate the sight of a 
book, and escape at every opportunity from school-work, 
by giving him difficult tasks, and neglecting his acutest 
faculties. " Children love motion and noise," says 
Basedow: ''here is a hint from nature." Yet the 
youngest children in most schools are expected to keep 
quiet and to sit at their books for as many hours as the 
youths of seventeen or eighteen. Their vivacity is re- 
pressed with the cane. Their delight in exercising their 
hands and eyes and ears is not noticed ; and they 
are required to keep their attention fixed on subjects 
often beyond their comprehension, and almost always 
beyond the range of their interests. Every one who has 



BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. 1 59 

had experience in teacliing boys knows how hard it is 
to get them to throw themselves heartily into any task 
whatever ; and probably this difficulty arises in many 
cases, from the habits of inattention and of shirking 
school-work, which the boys have acquired almost nec- 
essarily from the dreariness of their earliest lessons. 
Basedow determined to change all this ; and in the 
Philanthropin no doubt he succeeded. We have al- 
ready seen some of the expedients by which he sought 
to render school-work pleasurable. He appealed, wher- 
ever it was possible, to the children's senses; and these, 
especially the sight, were trained with great care by ex- 
ercises, such as drawing, shooting at a mark, etc. One 
of these exercises, intended to give quick perception, 
bears a curious likeness to what has since been practiced 
in a very different educational system. A picture, with 
a somewhat varied subject, was exhibited for a short 
time and removed. The boys had then, either verbally 
or on paper, to give an account of it, naming the differ- 
ent objects in proper order. Houdin, if I rightly re- 
member, tells us that the young thieves of Paris are 
required by their masters to make a mental inventory of 
the contents of a shop window, which they see only as 
they walk rapidly by. Other exercises of the Philan- 
thropin connected the pupils with more honorable call- 
ings. They became acquainted with both skilled and 
unskilled manual labor. Every boy was taught a handi- 
craft, such as carpentering and turning, and was put to 
such tasks as threshing corn. 

Basedow's Division of the Bay. Basedow's division of 
the twenty-four hours was the following: Eight hours 



l6o ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

for sleep, eight for food and amusement, and, for the 
children of the rich, six hours of school-work, and two 
of manual labor. In the case of the children of the 
poor, he would have the division of the last eight hours 
inverted, and would give for school-work two, and for 
manual labor six. The development of the body was 
specially cared for in the Philanthropin. Gymnastics 
were now first introduced into modern schools; and the 
boys were taken long expeditions on foot — the com- 
mencement, I believe, of a practice now common 
throughout Germany. 

Later History of the Philanthropin. As I have al- 
ready said, Basedow proved a very unfit person to be at- 
the head of the model Institution. Many of his friends 
agreed with Herder, that he was not fit to have calves 
intrusted to him, much less children. He soon re- 
signed his post; and was succeeded by Campe, who had 
been one of the visitors at the public examination. 
Campe did not remain long at the Philanthropin; but 
left it to set up a school, on like principles, at Hamburg. 
His fame now rests on his writings for the young; one 
of which — "Eobinson Crusoe the Younger'^ — is still a 
general favorite. 

Other distinguished men became connected with the 
Philanthropin — among them Salzmann, and Matthison 
the poet — and the number of pupils rose to over fifty ;. 
gathered, we are told, from all parts of Europe between 
Riga and Lisbon. But this number is by no means a 
fair measure of the interest, nay, enthusiasm which the 
experiment excited. We find Pastor Oberlin raising 
money on his wife^s ear-rings to send a donation. We 



BASEDOW AND THE PHILANTHROPIN. l6r 

find the Philosopher Kant prophesying that quite another 
race of men would grow up, now that education, accord- 
ing to Nature, had been introduced. 

Great Hopes Disappointed: Kant's Verdict. These 
hopes were disappointed. Kant confesses as much in 
the following passage in his treatise " On Paedagogy :'' 

" One fancies, indeed, that experiments in education 
Would not be necessary; and that we might judge by the 
understanding whether any plan would turn out well or 
ill. But this is a great mistake. Experience shows that 
often in our experiments we get quite opposite results 
from what we had anticipated. We see, too, that since 
experiments are necessary, it is not in the power of one 
generation to form a complete plan of education. The 
only experimental school which, to some extent, made a 
beginning in clearing the road, was the kistitute at Des- 
sau. This praise at least must be allowed, notwithstand- 
ing the many faults which could be brought up against 
it — faults which are sure to show themselves when we 
come to the results of our experiments, and which merely 
prove that fresh experiments are necessary. It was the 
only school in which the teachers had liberty to work 
according to their own methods and schemes, and where 
they were in free communication both among themselves 
and with all learned men throughout Germany." 

Close of the Philanthropin : Death of Basedow. We 
observe here, that Kant speaks of the Philanthropin as 
a thing of the past. It was finally closed in 1793. But 
even from Kant we learn that the experiment had been, 
by no means a useless one. The conservatives, of course, 
did not neglect to point out that young Philanthropists, 



1 62 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS, 

when they left school, were not in all respects the su- 
periors of their fellow-creatures. But, although no one 
could pretend that the Philanthropin had effected a tithe 
of what Basedow promised, and the " friends of human- 
ity ^^ throughout Europe expected, it had introduced 
many new ideas, which in time had their influence, even 
in the schools of the opposite party. Moreover, teachers 
who had been connected with the Philanthropin, founded 
schools on similar principles in different parts of Ger- 
many and Switzerland, some of which long outlived the 
parent institution. Their doctrines, too, made converts 
among other masters, the most celebrated of whom was 
Meierotto of Berlin. 

Little remains to be said of Basedow. He lived chiefly 
at Dessau, earning his subsistence by private tuition, 
and giving great offense by his irregularities, especially 
by drinking. In 1790, when visiting Magdeburg, he 
died, after a short illness, in his sixty-seventh year. 
His last words were, " I wish my body to be dissected 
for the good of my fellow-creatures." 



VII. 
PESTALOZZI. 



The Greatest of Reformers. John Henry Pestalozzi, 
the most celebrated of educational reformers, was born 
at Zurich, in 1746. At six years old he lost his father, 
who, leaving his family in needy circumstances, implored 



PESTALOZZI. 163 



their servant, the *^ faithful Babeli," never to desert his 
wife and children. Biibeli kept sacredly the promise slie 
gave to the dying man, and she had an equal share with 
the mother in bringing up the great educator. 

With no companions of his own age, Pestalozzi became 
so completely a mother^s child, that, as he himself tells 
us, he grew up a stranger to the world he lived in. This 
lonely childhood had its influence in making him, what 
he remained through life, a man of excitable feelings and 
lively imagination, which so entirely had the mastery 
over him as to prevent anything like due circumspection 
and forethought.* 

From his grandfather, a country clergyman, with 
whom he often stayed, he received another important 
influence, strong religious impressions. 

Youth of Pestalozzi. When at length he was sent to a 
day-school, he proved the awkwardest and most helpless 
of the scholars, and nevertheless showed signs of rare 
abilities. Among his playmates he was exposed to a 
good deal of ridicule, and was dubbed by them Harry 
Oddity of Foolborough, but his good nature and oblig- 
ing disposition gained him many friends. No doubt hi? 
Iriends profited from his willingness to do anything for 
them. We find that when, on the shock of an earth* 

* This will be best understood from the followlDg anecdote. 
When, in after years, he was in great pecuniary distress, and his 
family were without the necessaries of life, he went to a friend's 
liouse and borrowed a sum of money. On his way home, he fell 
in with a peasant who was lamenting the loss of a cow. Carried 
«,way as usual by his feelings, Pestalozzi gave the man all the 
money he had borrowed, and ran away to escape his thanks. 



164 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS, 

quake, teachers and scliolars alike rushed out of the^ 
school-house, Harry Oddity was the boy sent back to 
fetch out caps and books. In schoolwork, he says that 
though one of the best boys in the school, he often mad& 
mistakes which even the worst boys were not guilty of.. 
He could understand the sense of what he was taught^, 
and content with this, he neglected the form and ther 
exercises necessary to give him a practical acquaintance 
with the subject. 

Unpractical Education. As he grew up, the unprac- 
tical side of his character was more and more strongly 
developed. To use his words, *^ Unfortunately, the tone' 
of public instruction in my native town at this period 
was in a high degree calculated to foster this visionary 
fancy of taking an active interest in, and believing one- 
self capable of, the practice of things in which one had 
by no means sufficient exercise. While we were yet 
boys, we fancied that by a superficial school acquaint- 
ance with the great civil life of Greece and Rome, we 
could eminently prepare ourselves for the little civil life' 
in one of the Swiss cantons. By the writings of Rous- 
seau this tendency was increased — a tendency which was 
neither calculated to preserve what was good in the old 
institutions, nor to introduce anything substantially 
better." 

Pestalozzi's Hatred of Injustice. Lavater, when a 
young man of twenty, formed a league which was joined 
by Pestalozzi, a lad of fifteen. This league brought a 
public charge of injustice against Grebel, the governor 
of the Canton, and against Brunner, the mayor of Zurich. 
They also declared themselves against unworthy minis- 



PESTALOZZT. 165 



ters of religion. " The hate of wrong and love of right/' 
were, with Pestalozzi, not as we so often find them, mere 
Juvenile enthusiasms, but they remained with him for 
life. The oppression of the peasants moved him to a 
strong antagonism against the aristocracy, and when he 
was no longer young, he spoke of them as men on stilts, 
Avho must descend among the people before they could 
secure a natural and firm position. He also satirizes 
them in some of his fables, as e. g. that of the " Fishes 
and the Pikes," " The fishes in a pond brought an ac- 
'Cusation against the pikes who were making great rava- 
ges among them. The Judge, an old pike, said that 
their complaint was well founded, and that the defend- 
ants, to make amends, should allow two ordinary fish 
•every year to become pikes." 

Chooses the Profession of Law. His desire to be the 
champion of the ill-used peasantry, determined him in 
the choice of a profession, and he took to the study of 
the law. He had been intended for a clergyman, and, 
according to one account, had actually preached a trial 
sermon, which was a failure : with his usual inaccuracy, 
lie even went wrong in repeating the Lord's Prayer. 

Whilst a law student, he lost his most intimate friend, 
Bluntschli, who died of consumption. Bluntschli showed 
that he thoroughly understood Pestalozzi's character by 
his parting advice to him : ^' I die," said he; "and when 
you are left to yourself, you must not plunge into any 
career which, from your good-natured and confiding dis- 
position, might become dangerous to you. Seek for a 
quiet, tranquil career ; and unless you have at your side 
a man who will faithfully assist you with a calm, dispas- 



l66 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

sionate knowledge of men and things, by no means em~ 
bark in any extensive undertaking the failure of whicli 
would in any way be perilous to you/^ 

Results of Over-study. Soon after this, Pestalozzi,, 
from over-study, or rather perhaps from over-specula- 
tion — for he employed himself rather in forming theo- 
ries of what should be than in acquiring a practical ac- 
quaintance with the law as it was — became dangerously 
ill. The doctor advised him to go into the county, and 
influenced not more by this advice than by Eousseau'a 
doctrine of the natural state, Pestalozzi renounced the 
study of books, burnt his MSS., and went to learn farm- 
ing. 

Agriculture now Ms Passion. In his new employment 
he found himself with a friend of progress. '' I had come, 
to him,^' says Pestalozzi, " a political visionary, though 
with many profound and correct attainments, views, and 
anticipations in political matters. I went away from 
him just as great an agricultural visionary, though with 
many enlarged and correct ideas and intentions with, 
regard to agriculture." 

A rich Zurich firm was persuaded by Pestalozzi that 
the cultivation of madder would succeed on some poor 
land which was to be sold near the village of Birr at a 
very small price. With money advanced by them, he 
bought the land, built a house, which he called Neuhof 
(New Farm), and set to work. This was 1767, when he 
was only just of age. He was, of course, in love, and 
the lady belonged to a rich family. The following letter, 
which he addressed to her, has a double interest ; it gives 
us an insight into the noble character, as well as the 



PESTALOZZI. 167 

weaknesses, of the writer, and is, moreover, one of the 
most singular love-letters in existence. 

But now a Young Lady ; A Noble Love-letter. After 
telling her that he felt it his duty to limit his visits to 
her, as he had not the slightest ability to conceal his 
feelings, he proposes a correspondence, in which "we 
shall make our undisguised thoughts known to each other 
with all the freedom of oral conversation. Yes,'' he 
continues, ^^I will open myself fully and freely to you; 
I will even now, with the greatest candor, let you look 
as deep into my heart as I am myself able to penetrate; 
I will show you my vifews in the light of my present and 
future condition, as clearly as I see them myself. Dear- 
est Schultheiss, those of my faults which appear to me 
most important in relation to the situation in which I 
may be placed in after-hfe are, improvidence, incautious- 
ness, and a want of presence of mind to meet unexpected 
changes in my prospects. I know not how far these 
failings may be diminished by my efforts to counteract 
them by calm judgment and experience. At present, I 
have them still in such a degree that I dare not conceal 
them from the maiden I love ; they are faults, my dear, 
which deserve your fullest consideration. I have other 
faults, arising from my irritability and sensitiveness, 
which oftentimes will not submit to my judgment. I 
very frequently allow myself to run into excesses in 
praising and blaming, in my liking and disliking; I 
cleave so strongly to many things which I possess that 
the force with which I feel myself attached to them 
often exceeds the bounds of reason. Whenever my 
country or my friend is unhappy, I am myself unhappy. 



1 68 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Direct your attention to this weakness. There will be 
times when the cheerfulness and tranquillity of my soul 
will suffer under it. If even it does not hinder me in 
the discharge of my duties, yet I shall scarcely ever be 
great enough to fulfil them in such adverse circum- 
stances with the cheerfulness and tranquillity of a wise 
man who is ever true to himself. Of my great, and in- 
deed very reprehensible, negligence in all matters of eti- 
quette, and generally in all matters which are not in 
themselves of importance, I need not speak; any one 
may see them at first sight of me. I also owe you the 
open confession, my dear, that I shall always consider 
my duties toward my beloved partner subordinate to my 
duties toward my country; and that, although I shall 
be the tenderest husband, nevertheless I hold myself 
bound to be inexorable to the tears of my wife if she 
should ever attempt to restrain me by them from the 
direct performance of my duties as a citizen, whatever 
this must lead to. My wife shall be the confidante of 
my heart, the partner of all my most secret counsels. 
A great and honest simplicity shall reign in my house. 
And one thing more. My life will not pass without im- 
portant and very critical undertakings. I shall not for- 
get the precepts of Menalk, and my first resolutions to 
devote myself wholly to my country. I shall never, 
from fear of man, refrain from speaking when I see that 
the good of my country calls upon me to speak. My 
whole heart is my country's : I will risk all to alleviate 
the need and misery of my fellow-countrymen. What 
consequences may the undertakings to which I feel my- 
self urged on draw after them ! how unequal to them 



PESTALOZZI, 169 



am I ! and how imperative is my duty to show you the 
possibility of the great dangers which they may bring 
upon me ! 

'^ My dear, my beloved friend, I have now spoken can- 
didly of my character and my aspirations. Eeflect upon 
everything. If the traits which it was my duty to men- 
tion diminish your respect for me, you will still esteem 
my sincerity, and you will not think less highly of me, 
that I did not take advantage of your want of acquaint- 
ance with my character for the attainment of my inmost 
wishes.'^ 

Marriage. The young lady addressed was worthy of 
the letter and of its writer. In 1769, two years after 
Pestalozzi had established himself at Neuhof, the mar- 
riage took place — an unequal match, as it then seemed, 
the bride having money and personal attractions, and 
the bridegroom being notably deficient in both respects. 
Their married life extended over fifty years, and during 
that period the forebodings of the letter were amply 
realized. Pestalozzi sacrificed the comfort and worldly 
prospects of his family equally with his own to the pub- 
lic good, and yet we may well believe that Madame 
Pestalozzi never repented of her choice. 

Clouds Gather. The new married couple were soon in 
difficulties. The Zurich firm, not satisfied with the 
rumors which reached them of the management of the 
madder plantation, sent two competent judges to exam- 
ine into the state of affairs, and so unfavorable was their 
report, that the firm preferred getting back what money 
they could to leaving it any longer in Pestalozzi's hands. 
'^The cause of the failure of my undertaking,'' says 



I/O ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Pestalozzi, "lay essentially and exclusively in myself, 
and in my pronounced iacapacity for every kind of 
undertaking which requires practical ability." By 
means of his wife^s property, however, he was enabled 
to go on with his farming. 

Starts a School for Poor Children. Pestalozzi now 
resolved on an experiment such as Bluntschli had warned 
him against, and such as he himself must have had in 
his mind when he wi'ote his love-letter. Some years be- 
fore this, he had had his attention drawn to the subject 
of education by the publication of Rousseau's ^' Emile.'^ 
Feeling deeply the degradation of the surrounding peas- 
antry, he looked for some means of raising them out of 
it, and it seemed to him that the most hopeful way was 
to begin with the young, and to train them to capacity 
and intelligence. He therefore, in 1775, started a poor 
school. He soon had fifty children sent him, whom h& 
housed, boarded, and clothed, without payment from 
the parents. The children were to work for their main- 
tenance, during summer in the fields, in winter at spin- 
ning and other handicrafts. Pestalozzi himself was the 
schoolmaster, Neuhof was the schoolhouse. 

This also Fails. In this new enterprise Pestalozzi was 
still more unsuccessful than he had been in growing the 
madder. He was very badly treated both by parents 
and children, the latter often running away directly 
they got new clothes; and his industrial experiments 
were so carried on that they were a source of expense 
rather than profit. He says himself, that, contrary ta 
his own principles, which should have led him to begin 
at the beginning and lay a good foundation in teaching,. 



FESTALOZZI. I/I 



he put the children to work that was too difficult for 
them, wanted them to spin fine thread before their 
hands got steadiness and skill by exercise on the coarser 
kind, and to manufacture muslin before they could turn 
out well-made cotton goods. " Before I was aware of 
it/' he adds, " I was deeply involved in debt, and the 
greater part of my dear wife's property and expectations 
had, as it were, in an instant gone up in smoke." 

Eighteen Gloomy Years. We have now come to the 
most gloomy period in Pestalozzi's history, a period of 
eighteen years, and those the best years in a man's life, 
which Pestalozzi spent in great distress, from poverty 
without, and doubt and despondency within. When he 
got into difficulties, his friends, he tells us, loved him 
without hope: '^in the whole surrounding district it 
was everywhere said that I was a lost man, that nothing 
more could be done for me." ^^Iq his only too elegant 
country-house," we are told, '*^he often wanted money, 
bread, fuel, to protect himself against hunger and cold." 
''Eighteen years! — what a time for a soul like his to 
wait! History passes lightly over such a period. Ten, 
twenty, thirty years — it makes but a cipher difference 
if nothing great happens in them. But with what 
agony must he have seen day after day, year after year 
gliding by, who in his fervent soul longed to labor for 
the good of mankind and yet looked in vain for the 
opportunity !" (Palmer.) 

His own Account of Them. In after years he thus 
wrote of this gloomy period: ''Deep dissatisfaction was 
gnawing my heart. Eternal truth and eternal rectitude 
were converted by my passion to airy castles. With a 



172 £SSAVS Oh^ EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

hardened mind, I clung stubbornly to mere sounds, 
whicli had lost within me the basis of truth. Thus I de- 
graded myself every day more and more with the wor- 
ship of commonplace and the triimpetings of those 
•quackeries, wherewith these modern times pretend to 
better the condition of mankind/^ Again he says, " My 
head was gray, yet I was still a child. With a heart in 
which all the foundations of life were shaken, I still 
pursued, in those stormy times, my favorite object, but 
my way was one of prejudice, of passion, and of error. ^' 

Publishes " Evening Hour of a Hermit." But these 
years were not spent in idleness. Having no other 
means of influence, and indeed no other employment, 
he took to writing, and his experience as a teacher stood 
him in good stead as an author. In 1780 appeared, 
though not as a separate publication, the '^Evening 
Hour of a Hermit.'' To this series of aphorisms Pesta- 
lozzi appealed many years afterward to prove that he 
had always held the same views which he subsequently 
tried to carry out in practice. 

We hardly know how to reconcile the calm faith which 
is shown in the '^Evening Hour'' with what Pestalozzi 
has told us of his frame of mind at this period, and 
with the fact that he joined a French Eevolutionary 
society — the Illuminati — and became their leader in 
Switzerland. He did not, however, continue long with 
them ; and there is no difficulty in reconciling the 
*' Evening Hour" with all that we know of Pestalozzi in 
later life. 

Leonard and Gertrude. . In 1781 appeared the book 
on which Pestalozzi's fame as an author mainly rests — 



PESTALOZZI. 173 



*' Leonard and Gertrude '' — a work extorted from him, 
as he says, by sympathy with the sufferings of the peo- 
ple. In this simple tale — which '^flowed from his pen, 
he knew not how, and developed itself of its own ac- 
cord " — we have an admirable picture of village life in 
Switzerland. No wonder that the Berne Agricultural 
Society sent the author a gold medal, with a letter of 
thanks; and that the book excited vast interest, both in 
its native country and throughout Germany. It is only 
strange that " Leonard and Gertrude ^' has not become 
a favorite, by means of translations, in other countries. 
There was, indeed, an English translation, in two vol- 
umes, published more than fifty years ago; but this 
forerunner of the tales of Gotthelf is now hardly known 
in this country, even by name. 

Artistic Value of Leonard and Gertrude. In the works 
of a great artist, we see natural objects represented with 
perfect fidelity, and yet with a life breathed into them 
by genius which is wanting, or at least is not visible to 
common eyes, in the originals. Just so do we find 
Swiss peasant life depicted by Pestalozzi. The delinea- 
tion is evidently true to nature; and, at the same time, 
shows Nature as she reveals herself to genius. But for 
this work something more than genius was necessary, 
viz., sympathy and love. In the preface to the first 
edition, he says, *^' In that which I here relate, and which 
I have, for the most part, seen and heard myself in the 
course of an active life, I have taken care not once to 
add my own opinion to what I saw and heard the people 
themselves saying, feeling, believing, judging, and at- 
tempting. '' In a later edition (1800) he says, '^I de- 



174 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

sired nothing then, and I desire nothing else now, as 
the object of my life, but the welfare of the people, 
whom I love, and whom I feel to be miserable as few 
feel them to be miserable, because I have with them 
borne their sufferings as few have borne tliem/^ 

Pestalozzi^s friends now came to the conclusion that 
he had found his vocation at last, and that it was novel- 
writing ; but, throughout Europe, he met with many 
more discriminating readers. 

" Christopher and Alice ;" " Figures to my A B C Book." 
During his residence at Neuhof, where he continued to 
drag on a weary and depressed existence till he had been 
there, altogether, thirty years, he published several 
works, none of which had the success of ^^ Leonard and 
Gertrude.^' In 1782 appeared '' Christopher and Alice, ^' 
and in 1795 some fables, which he called "Figures to 
my ABO Book.^^ But the work which gave its author 
most trouble to compose, on which, he says, he labored 
for three long years with incredible toil, and which, 
when it did appear, was doomed to the most complete 
neglect, was his "Eesearches into the Course of Nature 
in the Development of the Human Eace/' 

Pestalozzi Embraces the Revolution. The conse- 
quences of the French Ee volution called Pestalozzi from 
his philosophical speculations. French troops poured 
into Switzerland. Everything was remodeled after the 
French pattern. The government was placed in the 
hands of five Directors, according to the phase which 
the supreme power had then (1798) taken in the model 
country. Pestalozzi avowed himself the champion of 
the new order of things, and his pen was at once em- 



FESTALOZZI. 1/5 



ployed by the Directors. These men had not, however, 
the discernment of Lavater, who once told Madame Pes- 
talozzi, '^I would consult your husband in everything 
>connected with the condition of the people, though I 
would never intrust him with a farthing of money/' 
By the Directors, Pestalozzi was not consulted at all. 
''1 wished for nothing,^' he said, "but that the sources 
of the savage and degraded state of the people might 
be stopped, and the evils flowing from them arrested. 
The Novi Homines of Helvetia, whose wishes went fur- 
ther, and who had no knowledge of the condition of the 
people, found, of course, that I was not the man for 
them. , They took every straw for a mast, by which they 
might sail the Eepublic to a safe shore ; but me, me 
alone, they took for a straw not fit for a fly to cling to. 
They did me good, however — more good than any men 
have ever done me — they restored me to myself. '"^ It 
■was thought that he had espoused their cause to secure 
for himself some Government appointment, and the 
Directors asked him what he would be. His answer was, 
*^1 will be a schoolmaster" — an answer which probably 
confirmed his friends in the opinion they had before ex- 
pressed, that he would end his days either in the poor- 
house or the mad-house. 

The Government places a School in his Hands. Among 
the directors was Le Grand, who entered into Pestalozzi's 
views, and at once placed at his disposal the means of 
opening a school in Aargau : but events occurred which 
led him to another sphere of labor, and caused him to 
undertake a much more difficult task. The Catholic 
and democratic canton of Unterwalden did not accept 



176 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

the changes which the French introduced. It was con- 
sequently invaded by a French army, many of the in- 
habitants were killed, and Stanz, the capital, was pillaged 
and burnt. These strong measures of their allies were 
in secret disapproved of by the Swiss Directors, who 
were, therefore, anxious to do what they could to relieve 
the sufferings of their fellow-countrymen. Le Grand 
proposed to Pestalozzi to give up his other plans for the 
present, and to go to Stanz and take charge of the orphan 
and destitute children there. Pestalozzi was not the 
man to refuse such a task as this. '' I went,^' he writes, 
*'l would have gone into the remotest clefts of the 
mountains to come nearer my aim, and now I really did 
come nearer. '^ 

Establishes a School at Stanz. He established himself 
with no assistants, and with only one servant, in a con- 
vent which was building for the Ursulines. There was 
but one room fit for occupation when he arrived. Chil- 
dren came flocking in, many of whom were orphans, and 
could hot be otherwise provided for. The one room 
became a schoolroom and a dormitory for Pestalozzi and 
as many children as it would hold. There were soon 
eighty under Pestalozzi's charge during the day, some of 
the neighbors taking in children to sleep. Of the eighty, 
many were beggar children, not accustomed to any con- 
trol, vicious in their habits, and afflicted with loathsome 
diseases. Those who had been better off were helpless 
and exacting. And for all these Pestalozzi, then over 
fifty years of age, undertook the management, the 
clothing, feeding, teaching, and even the performance 
of the most menial offices. The parents, who looked 



PESTALOZZI. 177 

upon him as the paid official of a hated Government, 
and, moreover, distrusted him as a Protestant, annoyed 
him in every way they could, and encouraged the chil- 
dren in disorder and discontent. And yet the Protestant 
was giving an example of love and self-sacrifice worthy 
of the noblest saint in the Calendar. This love did not 
lose its reward. By degrees it gained him the affection 
of the children, and introduced harmony and order into 
the chaos which at first surrounded him. 

Necessity the Mother of Invention. The very disad- 
vantages in which he was placed drove him to discoveries 
he would never otherwise have made. His whole school 
apparatus consisted of himself and his pupils; so he 
studied the children themselves, their wants and capaci- 
ties. "I stood in the midst of them, '^ he says, '^ pro- 
nouncing various sounds, and asking the children to 
imitate them. Whoever saw it was struck with the 
effect. It is true it was like a meteor which vanishes in 
the air as soon as it appears. No one understood its 
nature. I did not understand it myself. It was the 
result of a simple idea, or rather, of a fact of human na- 
ture, which was revealed to my feelings, but of which I 
was far from having a clear consciousness.^' Again he 
says, '^ Being obliged to instruct the children by myself, 
without any assistance, I learnt the art of teaching a 
great number together ; and as I had no other means of 
bringing the instruction before them than that of pro- 
nouncing everything to them loudly and distinctly, I was 
naturally led to the idea of making them draw, write, 
or work all at the same time." 

Confidence Arising from Perfect Attainment. '^The 



178 ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

confusion of so many voices repeating my words sug- 
gested the necessity of keeping time in our exercises, 
and I soon found that this contributed materially to 
make their impressions stronger and more distinct. 
Their total ignorance forced me to dwell a long time on 
the simplest elements, and I was thus led to perceive 
how much higher a degree of interest and power is ob- 
tained by a persevering attention to the elementary parts 
until they be perfectly familiar to the mind ; and what 
confidence and interest the child is inspired with by the 
consciousness of complete and perfect attainment, even 
in the lowest stage of instruction. Never before had I 
so deeply felt the important bearing which the first ele- 
ments of every branch of knowledge have upon its com- 
plete outline, and what immense deficiencies in the final 
result of it must arise from the confusion and imperfec- 
tion of the simplest beginnings. To bring these to ma- 
turity and perfection in the child's mind became now a 
main object of my attention ; and the success far sur- 
passed my expectations. The consciousness of energies 
hitherto unknown to themselves was rapidly developed 
in the children, and a general sense of order and har- 
mony began to prevail among them. They felt their 
own powers, and the tediousness of the common school 
tone vanished like a specter from the room. They were 
determined to try, they succeeded ; they persevered, they 
a,ccomplished and were delighted. Their mood was not 
that of laborious learning, it was the joy of unknown 
powers aroused from sleep ; their hearts and minds were 
elevated by the anticipation of what their powers would 
enable them to attempt and to effect. '' 



PESTALOZZI. 179 



Invents his System of Object-lessons. Of course his 
first difficulty was to arrest the attention of a great num- 
ber of children. This he overcame by appealing to their 
senses. Combining this experience with the ideas he 
liad received many years before from Rousseau, he in- 
vented his system of object-lessons. He was also driven 
by his needs to something like a system of monitors, 
though in an informal way. If a child was found to 
know anything he was put between two others to whom 
he might teach it. 

Thus, during the short period, not more than a year, 
which Pestalozzi spent among the children at Stanz, he 
settled the main features of the Pestalozzian system. 

Sickness and War breaks up the School. Sickness 
broke out among the children, and the wear and tear 
was too great even for Pestalozzi. He would probably 
have sunk under his efforts if the French, pressed by the 
Austrians, had not entered Stanz, in January, 1799, and 
taken part of the Ursuline Convent for a military 
hospital, Pestalozzi was, therefore, obliged to break up 
the school, and he himself went to a medicinal spring on 
the Gurnigel in the Canton Bern. '''Here," he says, 
'^ I enjoyed days of recreation. I needed them. It is a 
wonder that I am still alive. I shall not forget those 
days as long as I live ; they saved me : but I could not 
live without my work." He came down from the Gur- 
nigel, and began to teach in the primary schools (i.e., 
schools for children from four to eight years old) of 
Burgdorf, the second town in the Canton. Here the 
director was jealous of him, and he met with much oppo- 
sition. '^ It was whispered," he tells us, ''that I myself 



l80 £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

could not write nor work accounts, nor even read prop- 
erly. Popular reports," lie adds, "are not always en- 
tirely wrong. It is true I could not write nor read nor 
work accounts well." 

A strange account has been left us of his teaching in 
the school by Eamsauer, then a scholar in it, and after- 
ward one of Pestalozzi's assistants : — 

Ramsauer's Account of Pestalozzi's Teaching. ^' I got 
about as much regular schooling as the other scholars," 
he writes — that is, none at all ; '^but Pestalozzi's sacred 
zeal, his devoted love, which caused him to be entirely 
unmindful of himself, his serious and depressed state of 
mind, which struck even the children, made the deepest 
impression on me, and knit my childlike and grateful 
heart to his forever. Pestalozzi^s intention was, that all 
the instruction given in this school should start from 
form, number, and language, and should have constant 
reference to these elements. There was no regular plan^ 
not any time-table. He taught nothing but drawing, 
ciphering, and exercises in language. ... He had 
not patience to allow things to be gone over a second 
time, or to put questions (in arithmetic), and in his enor- 
mous zeal for the instruction of the whole school, he 
seemed not to concern himself in the slightest degree for 
the individual scholar. The best things we had with 
him were the exercises in language, at least those which 
he gave us on the paper-hangings of the school-room, 
which were real exercises in observation. 'Boys,' he 
would say (he never named the girls), ' what do you see t" 
Answer — 'A hole in the wainscot.' Pestalozzi — 'Very 
good. Now repeat after me — I see a hole in the wain.- 



PESTALOZZI. l8l 



scot. I see a long liole iu the waiuscot. Through the 
hole I see the wall. Through the long narrow hole I see 
the wall/ and so forth. As Pestalozzi, in his zeal, did 
not tie himself to any particular time, we generally went 
on until eleven o'clock with whatever we commenced at 
eight, and by ten o'clock he was always tired and hoarse. 
We knew when It was eleven by the noise of the other 
school-children in the street, and then we usually all ran 
out without bidding good-bye." 

After this account of Pestalozzi's instruction, we can 
hardly wonder that the school rector at Burgdorf was 
not grateful for his assistance. 

Pestalozzi and Kriisi open a New School ; " How Ger- 
trude Teaches her Children." In less than a year Pesta- 
lozzi left this school in bad health, and joined Kriisi in 
opening a new school in Burgdorf Castle, for which he 
afterward (1802) obtained Government aid. Here he 
was assisted in carrying out his system by Kriisi, Tobler, 
and Bluss. He now embodied the results of his experi- 
ence in a work which has obtained great celebrity — 
'^ How Gertrude Teaches her Children.'' 

In 1802 Pestalozzi, for once in his life a successful and 
popular man, was elected a member of a deputation sent 
Ijy the Swiss people to Paris. 

The Institute at Yverdun Founded. On the restoration 
Ol the Cantons in 1804, the Castle of Burgdorf was again 
occupied by one of the chief magistrates, and Pestalozzi 
and his establishment were moved to the Monastery of 
Buchsee. Here the teachers gave the principal direction 
to another, the since celebrated Fellenberg, " not with- 
out my consent," says Pestalozzi, "but to my profound 



l8'^ ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

mortification." He therefore soon accepted an invi- 
tation from the inhabitants of Yverdun to open an insti- 
tution there, and within a twelvemonth he was followed 
by his old assistants, who had found government byFel- 
lenberg less to their taste than no-government by Pesta- 
lozzi. 

Its World-wide Reputation ; General Character of its 
Work. The Yverdun Institute had soon a world-wide 
reputation. Pestalozzian teachers went from it to 
Madrid, to Naples, to St. Petersburg. Kings and phi- 
losophers joined in doing it honor. But, as Pestalozzi 
himself has testified, these praises were but as a laurel- 
wreath encircling a skull. The life of the Pestalozzian 
institutions had been the love which the old man had 
infused into all the members, teachers as well as chil- 
dren ; but this life was wanting at Yverdun. The es- 
tablishment was mu6h too large to be carried on success- 
fully without more method and discipline than Pesta- 
lozzi, remarkable, as he himself says, for his " unrivaled 
incapacity to govern," was master of. 

Dissensions among the Teachers. The assistants began 
each to take his own line, and even the outward show 
of unity was soon at an end. Nothing is less interesting 
or profitable than the details of bygone quarrels, so I 
will not go into the great feud between Niederer and 
Schmid, which in its day made a good deal of noise in 
the scholastic world, as even less important disputes 
have done and will do in the world at large. There 
were, too, many mistakes made at Yverdun. Pestalozzi 
was mad with enthusiasm to improve elementary educa- 
tion, especially for the poor, throughout Europe. His 



PESTALOZZI. 183 

zeal led him to announce his schemes and methods before 
he had given them a fair trial ; hence many foolish things 
came abroad as Pestalozzianism, and hindered the re- 
ception of principles and practices which better deserved 
the name. Pestalozzi, too, unfortunately thought that 
his influence depended on the opinion which was formed 
of his institution ; so he published a highly-colored 
account of it, and tried to conceal its defects from the 
strangers by whom he was constantly visited (see Appen- 
dix, p. 320). "His highly active imagination,'^ says 
Raumer, himself for some time an inmate of the institu- 
tion, "led him to see and describe as actually existing 
whatever he hoped sooner or later to realize." The ene- 
mies of change made the most of these discrepancies, 
and this, joined with financial difficulties consequent on 
Pestalozzi's mismanagement, and with the scandals 
which arose out of the dissensions of the Pestalozzians, 
brought his institution to a speedy and unhonored close. 
His Sun goes down in Clouds. Thus the sun went 
down in clouds, and the old man, when he died at the 
age of eighty, in 1827, had seen the apparent failure of 
all his toils. He had not, however, failed in reality. It 
has been said of him that his true function was to edu- 
cate ideas, not children, and when twenty years later the 
centenary of his birth was celebrated by schoolmasters, 
not only in his native country, but throughout Germany, 
it was found that Pestalozzian ideas had been sown, and 
were bearing fruit, over the greater part of central 
Europe. 



1 84 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 



PESTALOZZIANISM. 

Great Question of Education from Seven to Twelve. 

As it seems to the present writer, the worst part of our 
educational course — the part which is wrong in theory 
and pernicious in practice — is our instruction of children, 
say between the ages of seven and twelve. Before seven 
years old, there is often no formal instruction, and per- 
haps there should be none. Pestalozzi would have chil- 
dren systematically taught from the cradle ; but I can not 
help doubting the wisdom, or at least the necessity of 
this. Nature offers the succession of impressions to the 
child^s senses without any regular order. Art should 
come to her assistance, says Pestalozzi, and organize a 
connected series of such impressions. It may well be 
questioned, however, if the child will be benefited by 
being put through any course of the kind. Lord Lytton, 
wittily, and in my opinion wisely, applies to this subject 
the story of the man who thought his bees would make 
honey faster, if instead of going in search of flowers, 
they were shut up and had the flowers brought to them. 
The way in which children -turn from object to object, 
like the bees from flower to flower, is surely an indication 
to us that Nature herself teaches at this age by an infin- 
ite variety of impressions which we should no more 
attempt to throw into what we call regular order than 
we should employ a drill-sergeant to teach infants to 
walk. Of course I do not mean that there is no educa- 
tion for children, however young ; but the school is the 



PESTALOZZI. 185 

mother^s knee, and the lessons learnt there are other and 
more valuable than object-lessons.* 

The time for teaching, technically so called, comes at 
last, and what is to be done then ? Let us consider 
briefly what is done. 

Education as Development. There are in education 
few maxims which are so universally accepted as this — 
that education is, if not wholly, at least in a great 
measure, the development of faculties rather than the 
imparting of knowledge. On this principle alone is it 
possible to Justify the amount of time given by the 
higher forms in schools and by undergraduates at the 
Universities to the study of classics and mathematics. 
In all the attempts which have been made to depreciate 
these studies no one of any authority has disputed that, 
if they are indeed the best means of training the mind, 
they should be maintained in their present monopoly, 
even though the knowledge acquired were sure to drop 
off, ^'^ Like the tadpole^s tail," when the scholars entered 
on the business of life. We are agreed, then, that in 
youth the faculties are to be trained, not the knowledge 
given, for adult age. 

Childhood Sacrificed to Learning. But when we come 
to childhood we forget this principle entirely, and think 
not so much of cultivating the faculties for youth as of 
communicating the knowledge which will then come in 
useful. We see clearly enough that it would be absurd 
to cram the mind of a youth with laws of science or art 

* See, however, some observations of Mr. Herbert Spencer on 
the other side. — Education, pp. 81, ff. 



1 86 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

or commerce which he could not understand, on the 
ground that the getting-up of these things might save 
him trouble in after-life. But we do not hesitate to sac- 
rifice childhood to the learning by heart of grammar- 
rules, Latin declensions, historical dates, and the like, 
with no thought whatever of the child's faculties, but 
simply with a view of giving him knowledge (if knowl- 
edge it can be called) that will come in useful five or six 
years afterward. We do not treat youths thus, probably 
because we have more sympathy with them, or at least 
understand them better. The intellectual life to which 
the senses and the imaginations are subordinated in the 
man, has already begun in the youth. In an inferior 
degree he can do what the man can do, and understand 
what the man can understand. He has already some 
notion of reasoning, and abstraction, and generalization. 
But with the child it is very different. His active facul- 
ties may be said almost to differ in kind from a man's. 
He has a feeling for the sensuous world which he will 
lose as he grows up. His strong imagination, under no 
control of the reason, is constantly at work building 
castles in the air, and investigating the doll or the pup- 
pet-show with all the properties of the things they repre- 
sent. His feelings and affections, easily excited, find an 
object to love or dislike in every person and thing he 
meets with. On the other hand, he has no conception 
of what is abstract, and no interest except in actual 
known persons, animals, and things. 

Difference between Childhood and Youth. There is, 
then, between the child of nine and the youth of four- 
teen or fifteen a greater difference than between the 



PESTALOZZL 18/ 



youth and the man of twenty ; and this demands a cor- 
responding difference in their studies. And yet, as mat- 
ters are carried on now, the child is too often kept to 
the drudgery of learning by rote mere collections of hard 
words, perhaps, too, in a foreign language ; and absorbed 
by the present, he gets little comfort from the teacher's 
lime olim meminisse juvabit. (It will be delightful to 
recall these things.) 

How to educate the child is doubtless the most diffi- 
cult problem of all, and it is generally allotted to those 
who are the least likely to find a satisfactory solution. 

Preparatory Schools — Often Injurious to both Mind and 
Body. The earliest educator of the children of many 
rich parents is the nursemaid — a person not usually dis- 
tinguished by either intellectual or moral excellence. 
At an early age, this educator is superseded by the Pre- 
paratory School. Taken as a body, the ladies whose 
pecuniary needs compel them to open '^ establishments 
for young gentlemen" (though doubtless possessed of 
many excellent qualities) can not be said to hold en- 
larged views, or indeed any views whatever on the 
subject of education. Their intention is not so much 
to cultivate the children's faculties as to make a liveli- 
hood, and to hear no complaints that pupils who have 
left them have been found deficient in the expected 
knowledge by the master of their new school. If any 
one would investigate the sort of teaching which is con- 
sidered adapted to the capacity of children at this stage, 
let him look into a standard work still in vogue (" Mang- 
nalFs Questions"), from which the young of both sexes 
acquire a great quantity and variety of learning ; the 



1 88 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

whole of ancient and modern history and biography, 
together with the heathen mythology, the planetary sys- 
tem, and the names of all the constellations, lying very 
compactly in about 300 pages. 

Unfortunately, moreover, from the gentility of these 
ladies, their scholars' bodies are often treated in pre- 
paratory schools no less injuriously than their minds. 
It may be natural in a child to use his lungs and delight 
in noise, but this can hardly be considered geyiteel, so 
the tendency is, as far as possible, suppressed. It is 
found, too, that if children are allowed to run about 
they get dirty and spoil their clothes, and do not look 
like " young gentlemen,'' so they are made to take exer- 
cise in a much more genteel fashion, walking slowly two - 
and-two, with gloves on. 

Blunders in Early Education. At nine or ten years 
old, boys are commonly put to a school taught by mas- 
ters. Here they lose sight of their gloves, and learn the 
use of their limbs ; but their minds are not so fortunate 
as their bodies. The studies of the school have been 
arranged without any thought of their peculiar needs. 
The youngest class is generally the largest, often much 
the largest, and it is handed over to the least competent 
and worst paid master on the staff of teachers. The 
reason is, that little boys are found to learn the tasks im- 
* posed upon them very slowly. A youth or man who came 
fresh to the Latin grammar would learn in a morning 
as much as the master, with great labor, can get into 
children in a week. It is thought, therefore, that the 
best teaching should be applied where it will have most 
result. If any one were to say to the manager of a 



FESTALOZZI. 1 89 



school, ^' The master who takes the lowest form teaches 
badly, and the children learn nothing;" he would per- 
haps say, '^ Very likely; but if I paid a much higher 
salary, and got a better man, they would learn but lit- 
tle." The only thing the school-manager thinks of is. 
How much do the little boys learn of what is taught in 
the higher forms ? How their faculties are being devel- 
oped, or whether they have any faculties except for 
reading, writing, and arithmetic, and for getting gram- 
mar rules, etc., by heart, he is not so "unpractical" as 
to inquire. 

Merits of Pestalozzi. Pestalozzi, it has been said, in> 
vented nothing new. Most assuredly he did not invent 
the principle that education is a developing of the facul- 
ties rather than an imparting of knowledge. But he 
did much to bring this truth to bear on early education^ 
and to make it not only received but acted on. 

Much has been written about the amount of originality 
which may be allowed to Pestalozzi, but the question is, 
after all, of no great importance. We must, at least, 
concede to him the merit which he himself claims, of 
having "lighted upon truths little noticed before, and 
principles which, though almost generally acknowledged, 
were seldom carried out in practice."* As Sydney 
Smith said of Hamilton, " his must be the credit of the 
man who is so deeply impressed with the importance of 
what he thinks he has discovered that he will take no 
denial, but, at the risk of fame and fortune, pushes 

* Letters on Early Education, vi. p. 23. 



190 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

through all opposition, and is determined the discovery 
shall not perish, at least for want of a fair trial." 

But Pestalozzi is distinguished from other educators 
not more by what he did, than by what he endeavored 
to do ; in other words, his differentia is rather his aim 
than his method. 

The Root of Pestalozzi's System, The Enthusiasm of 
Humanity. If we seek for the root of Pestalozzi^s sys- 
tem, we shall find it, I think, in that which was the 
motive power of Pestalozzi's career, ^^the enthusiasm of 
humanity." Consumed with grief for the degradation 
of the Swiss peasantry, he never lost faith in their true 
dignity as men, and in the possibility of raising them to 
a condition worthy of it. He cast about for the best 
means of thus raising them, and decided that it could, 
be effected, not by any improvement in their outward 
circumstances, but by an education which should make 
them what their Creator intended them to be, and should 
give them the use and the consciousness of all their in- 
born faculties. ^^From my youth up," he says, ^^I felt 
what a high and indispensable human duty it is to labor 
for the poor and miserable ; . . . that he may attain to 
a consciousness of his own dignity through his feeling of 
the universal powers and endowments which he possesses 
awakened within him ; that he may not only learn to 
gabble over by rote the religious maxim that ^ man is 
created in the image of God, and is bound to live and 
die as a child of God,' but may himself experience its 
truth by virtue of the Divine power within him, so that 
he may be raised, not only above the plowing oxen, but 



PESTALOZZT. I9I 

also above the man in purple and silk who lives unworth- 
ily of his high destiny. '^ * 

Pestalozzi's High Conception of Education. Again he 
says (and I quote at length on the point, as it is indeed 
the key to Pestalozzianism), "Why have I insisted so 
strongly on attention to early physical and intellectual 
education ? Because I consider these as merely leadino- 
to a higher aim, to qualify the human being for the free 
and full use of all the faculties implanted by the Crea- 
tor, and to direct all these faculties toward the perfec- 
tion of the whole being of man, that he may be enabled 
to act in his peculiar station as an instrument of that 
All-wise and Almighty Power that has called him into 
life." t 

Believing in this high aim of education, Pestalozzi 
required a proper early training for all alike. " Everv 
human being," said he, "has a claim to a judicious de- 
velopment of his faculties by those to whom the care of 
his infancy is confided."J 

What is Demanded of Mothers — A Thinking Love. 
Pestalozzi therefore most earnestly addressed himself to 
mothers, to convince them of the power placed in their 
hands, and to teach them how to use it. " The mother 
is qualified, and qualified by the Creator Himself, to be- 
come the principal agent in the development of her 
child ; . . . and what is demanded of her is— a thinking 
love. . . . God has given to thy child all the faculties of 

* Quoted in Barnard, p. 13. 
\ Letters on Early Education, xxxii. p. 160. 
X Ibid, xxxii. p. 163. For the very striking passage which fol- 
lows see Note on pp. 203, 204 infra. 



192 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

our nature, but the grand point remains undecided — how 
shall this heart, this head, these hands, be employed ? to 
whose service shall they be dedicated ? A question the an- 
swer to which involves a futurity of happiness or misery 
to a life so dear to thee. ... It is recorded that God 
opened the heavens to the patriarch of old, and showed 
him a ladder leading thither. This ladder is let down 
to every descendant of Adam; it is offered to thy child. 
But he must be taught to climb it. And let him not 
attempt it by the cold calculations of the head, or the 
mere impulse of the heart; but let all these powers com- 
bine, and the noble enterprise will be crowned with suc- 
cess. These powers are already bestowed on him, but to 
thee it is given to assist in calling them forth."* ^^ Ma- 
ternal love is the first agent in education. . . . Through 
it the child is led to love and trust his Creator and his. 
Redeemer." 

Development of the Faculties. From the theory of 
development which lay at the root of Pestalozzi's views 
of education, it followed that the imparting of knowledge 
and the training for special pursuits held only a subordi- 
nate position in his scheme. "Education, instead of 
merely considering what is to be imparted to children, 
ought to consider first what they may be said already to 
possess, if not as a developed, at least as an involved 
faculty capable of development. Or if, instead of speak- 
ing thus in the abstract, we will but recollect that it is 
to the great Author of life that man owes the possession, 
and is responsible for the use, of his innate faculties, 
education should not only decide what is to be made of 

* Letters on Early Education, v. p. 21. 



PESTALOZZI.\ 193 



a child, but rather inquire, what it was intended that he 
should become ? What is his destiny as a created and 
responsible being ? What are his faculties as a rational 
and moral being ? What are the means for their per- 
fection, and the end held out as the highest object of 
^heir efforts by the Almighty Father of all, both in crea- 
*-ion and in the page of revelation ?" 

Education a Continual Benevoieno Superintendence. 
JSducation, then, must consist " in a continual benevolent 
superintendence, with the object of calling forth all the 
faculties which Providence has implanted; and its prov- 
ince, thus enlarged, will yet be with less difficulty sur- 
Teyed from one point of view, and will have more of a 
systematic and truly philosophical character, than an 
incoherent mass of exercises — arranged without unity of 
principle, and gone through without interest — which too 
often usurps its name/' 

An education of the latter description he denounced 
with the zeal of a Luther. 

Denunciation of the Present Race of Schoolmasters. 
'^The present race of schoolmasters," he writes, "sacri- 
Sce the essence of true teaching to separate and discon- 
aected teaching in a complete jumble of subjects. By 
dishing up fragments of all kinds of truths, they destroy 
the spirit of truth itself, and extinguish the power of 
self-dependence which, without that spirit, can not ex- 
ist."* 

Development of the Affections. With Pestalozzi teach- 
ing was not so much to be thought of as training. 

* Quoted by Carl Schmidt. Gesch. d. Pad, vol. iv. p. 87. 



194 £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Training must be found for the child's heart, head, and 
hand, and the capacities of the heart and head must be 
developed by practice no less than those of the hand. 
The heart, as we have seen, is first influenced by the 
mother. At a later period Pestalozzi would have the 
charities of the family circle introduced into the school- 
room (rather ignoring the difference which the altered 
ratio of the young to the adults makes in the conditions 
of the problem), and would have the child taught virtue 
by his affections being exercised and his benevolence 
guided to action. There is an interesting instance on 
record of the way in which he himself applied this prin- 
ciple. When he was at Stan?, news arrived of the de- 
struction of Altdorf. Pestalozzi depicted to his scholars 
the misery of the children there. ^^ Hundreds," said 
he, " are at this moment wandering about as you were 
last year, without a home, perhaps without food or cloth- 
ing." He then asked them if they would not wish to 
receive some of these children among them ? This, of 
course, they were eager to do. Pestalozzi then pointed 
out the sacrifices it would involve on their part, that 
they would have to share everything with the new com- 
ers, and to eat less and work more than before. Only 
when they promised to make these sacrifices ungrudg- 
ingly, he undertook to apply to Government that the 
children's wish might be granted. It was thus that Pes- 
talozzi endeavored to develop the moral and religious 
life of the children, which is based on trust and love. 

The Child's Intellect Capable of Development from the 
Mrst Dawn of Consciousness. The child's thinking fac- 
ulty is capable, according to Pestalozzi, of being exer- 



PESTALOZZL I95 



oised almost from the commencement of consciousness. 
Indeed, it has been objected against Pestalozzi's system 
that he cultivated the mere intellectual powers at the 
expense of the poetical and imaginative. All knowl- 
edge, he taught, is acquired by sensation and observa- 
tion : sometimes it has been thought that he traces 
everything originally to the senses; but he seems to ex- 
tend the word Anschauiing to every experience of which 
the mind becomes conscious.* 

Observation, Memory, Reflection. The child, then, 
must be made to observe accurately, and to reflect on 
its observations. The best subject-matter for the les- 
sons will be the most ordinary things that can be found, 
*' Not only is there not one of the little incidents in the 
life of a child, in his amusements and recreations, in his 
relation to his parents, and friends, and playfellows ; 
but there is actually not anything within the reach of a 
child's attention, whether it belong to nature or to the 
employments and arts of life, that may not be made the 
object of a lesson by which some useful knowledge may 
be imparted, and, what is still more important, by which 
the child may not be familiarized with the habit of 
thinking on what he sees, and speaking after he has 
thought. The mode of doing this is not by any meang 

*I dare say I am not the only English reader of German books 
who has been perplexed by the words Anschauung and anschau- 
lich. The word seems used, in fact, for the mind's becoming 
conscious of any fact immediately by experience, in contra^ 
distinction to inferences from symbols. To make instruction 
nnschaulicli, therefore, is to make the learner acquire knowledge 
by his direct experiences. 



196 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

to talk much to a child, but to enter into conversation 
with a child; not to address to him many words, how- 
ever familiar and well chosen, but to bring him to ex- 
press himself on the subject; not to exhaust the subject, 
but to question the child about it, and to let him find 
out and correct the answers. It would be ridiculous to 
expect that the volatile spirits of a child could be brought 
to follow any lengthy explanations. The attention is 
deadened by long expositions, but roused by animated 
questions. Let these questions be short, clear, and in- 
telligible. Let them not merely lead the child to repeat 
in the same, or in varied terms, what he has heard just 
before. Let them excite him to observe what is before 
him, to recollect what he has learned, and to muster his 
little stock of knowledge for materials for an answer. 
Show him a certain quality in one thing, and let him 
find out the same in others. Tell him that the shape of 
a ball is called roiond, and if, accordingly, you bring him 
to point out other objects to which the same property 
belongs, you have employed him more usefully than by 
the most perfect discourse on rotundity. In the one in- 
stance he would have had to listen and to recollect, in 
the other he has to observe and to think.''* '^From 
observation and memory there is only one step to reflec- 
tion. Though imperfect, this operation is often found 
among the early exercises of the infant mind. The 
powerful stimulus of inquisitiveness prompts to ex- 
ertions which, if successful or encouraged by others, 
will lead to a habit of thought, "f 

* Letters on Early Education, xxxix. p. 147. 
\ Ibid. XX. p. 92. 



PESTALOZZI. 197 



The Idea First, then the Word. Words, which are the 
signs of things, must never be taught the child till he 
has grasped the idea of the thing signified. 

When an object has been submitted to his senses, he 
must be led to the consciousness of the impressions pro- 
duced, and then must be taught the name of the object 
and of the qualities producing those impressions. Last 
of all, he must ascend to the definition of the object. 

Three Great Classes of Object-lessons. The object^ 
lessons Pestalozzi divided into three great classes, under 
the heads of— (1) Form; (2) Number; (3) Speech. I^ 
was his constant endeavor to make his pupils distinguish 
between essentials and accidentals, and with his habit 
of constant analysis, which seems pushed to an extreme 
that to children would be repulsive, he sought to reduce 
Form, Number, and Speech to their elements. In his 
alphabet of Form everything was represented as having 
the square as its base. In Number all operations were 
traced back to 1 -f 1. In Speech the children, in their 
Yery cradles, were to be taught the elements of sound, 
as ba, ba, ba, da, da, da, ma, ma, ma, etc. This ele- 
mentary teaching Pestalozzi considered of the greatest 
importance, and when he himself instructed he went 
over the ground very slowly. Buss tells us that when 
he first joined Pestalozzi the delay over the prime ele- 
ments seemed to him a waste of time, but that afterward 
he was convinced of its being the right plan, and felt 
that the failure of his own education was due to its in- 
coherent and desultory cliaracter. 

Important Bearing of the First Elements. "Not 
only," says Pestalozzi, " have the first elements of knowl- 



iqS essays on educational reformers. 

edge in every subject the most important bearing on its 
complete outline, but the child's confidence and interest 
are gained by perfect attainment even in the lowest stage 
of instruction." By his object-lessons Pestalozzi aimed 
at — 1, enlarging gradually the sphere of a child^s intui- 
tion, i.e., increasing the number of objects falling un- 
der his immediate perception; 2, impressing upon him 
those perceptions of which he had become conscious, 
with certainty, clearness, and precision; 3, imparting to 
him a comprehensive knowledge of language for the ex- 
pression of whatever had become or was becoming an 
object of his consciousness, in consequence either of the 
spontaneous impulse of his own nature, or of the assist- 
ance of tuition. 

Instruction in Arithmetic. Of all the instruction given 
at Yverdun, the most successful, in the opinion of those 
who visited the school, was the instruction in arithme- 
tic. The children are described as performing with 
great rapidity very difficult tasks in head-calculation, 
Pestalozzi based his method here, as in other subjects, 
on the principle that the individual should be brought 
to knowledge by a road similar to that which the whole 
race had used in founding the science. Actual counting 
of things preceded the first Cocker, as actual measur- 
ing of land preceded the original Euclid. The child 
then must be taught to count things, and to find out 
the various processes experimentally in the concrete be- 
fore he is given any abstract rule, or is put to any ab- 
stract exercises. This plan is now commonly adopted 
in German schools, and many ingenious contrivances 



PESTALOZZI. 199 



have been introduced by which the combinations of 
things can be presented to the children's sight. 

First the Aifections and the Intellect, then Physical 
Education. Next to the education of the affections and 
the intellect come those exercises in which the body is 
more prominent. I do not know that there was any- 
thing distinctive in Pestalozzi's views and practices in 
physical education, although he attached the due im- 
portance to it which had previously been perceived only 
by Locke and Routsj.iu, and in Germany by Basedow 
and his colleagues of the Philanthropin. 

The Cultivation of the Senses should Issue in Artistic 
Training. Great pains should be taken with the cul- 
tivation of the senses, and finally tlie artistic faculty 
(Kunstkraft) should be developed, in which the power 
of the mind and that of the senses are united. Music 
and drawing played a leading part in Pestalozzi's schools. 
They were taught to all the children, even the youngest, 
and were not limited to the conventional two hours a 
week. It is natural to children to imitate ; thus they 
acquire language, and thus, with proper direction and 
encouragement, they will find pleasure in attempting to 
sing the melodies they hear, and to draw the simple ob- 
jects around them. By drawing, the eye is trained as 
well as the hand. " A person who is in the habit of 
drawing, especially from nature, will easily perceive 
many circumstances which are commonly overlooked, 
and will form a much more correct impression, even of 
such objects as he does not stop to examine minutely, 
than one who has never been taught to look upon what 
he sees with an intention of reproducing a likeness of it. 



2O0 ]£SSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

The attention to the exact shape of the whole^, and the 
proportion of the parts, which is requisite for the taking 
of an adequate sketch, is converted into a habit, and be- 
comes productive both of instruction and amusement." * 

Besides drawing, Pestalozzi recommended modeling, 
^ hint which was afterward worked out by Frobel in has 
Kindergarten. 

Instruction not Always to be Given in Guise of Amuse- 
ment. Differing from Locke and Basedow, Pestalozzi 
was no friend to the notion of giving instruction always 
in the guise of amusement. " I am convinced," says he, 
"that such a notion will forever preclude solidity of 
knowledge, and, from want of sufficient exertions on the 
part of the pupils, will lead to that very result which I 
wish to avoid by my principle of a constant employment 
of the thinking powers. A child must very early in life 
be taught the lesson that exertion is indispensable for 
the attainment of knowledge." But a child should not 
be taught to look upon exertion as an evil. ' He should 
be encouraged, not frightened into it. "An interest in 
study is the first thing which a teacher should endeavor 
to excite and keep alive. There are scarcely any cir- 
cumstances in which a want of application in children 
does not proceed from a want of interest ; and there are 
perhaps none in which the want of interest does not 
originate in the mode of teaching adopted by the teacher. 
I would go so far as to lay it down as a rule, that when- 
ever children are inattentive and apparently take no in- 
terest in a lesson, the teacher should always first look to 

* Letters on Early Education, xxiv. p. 117. 



PESTALOZZI. 20 1 

himself for the reason. . . . Could we conceive the in- 
describable tedium which must oppress the young mind 
while the weary hours are slowly passing away one after 
another in occupations which it can neither relish nor 
understand, could we remember the like scenes which 
our own childhood has passed through, we should no 
longer be surprised at the remissness of the schoolboy, 
^creeping like snail unwillingly to school/ ... To 
change all this, 'we must adopt a better mode of in- 
struction, by which the children are less left to them- 
selves, less thrown upon the unwelcome employment of 
passive listening, less harshly treated for little excusable 
failings ; but more roused by questions, animated by 
illustrations, interested and won by kindness.' 

Interest begets Interest. ^^ There is a most remarkable 
reciprocal action between the interest which the teacher 
takes and that which he communicates to his pupils. 
If he is not with his whole mind present at the subject, 
if he does not care whether he is understood or not, 
whether his manner is liked or not, he will alienate the 
affections of his pupils, and render them indifferent to 
what he says. But real interest taken in the task of in- 
struction — kind words and kinder feelings — the very ex- 
pression of the features, and the glance of the eye, are 
never lost upon children. ''* 

What may be learned from Pestalozzi. In conclusion, 
I would ask, " Have English schoolmasters nothing to 
learn from Pestalozzi ? Do they aim at a plan of educa- 
tion which shall be founded on a knowledge of human 

* Letters on Early Education, xxx. p. 150. 



202 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

nature, and at modes of instruction which shall develop 
their pupils' faculties ? '' Perhaps some will be inclined 
to answer, ^^ Fine words no doubt, and in a sense very 
true, that education should be the unfolding of the fac- 
ulties according to the Divine idea ; but between this 
high poetical theory and the dull prose of actual school- 
teaching, there is a great gulf fixed, and we cannot at- 
tend to both at the same time." I know full well how 
different theories and plans of education seem to us 
when we are at leisure, and can think of them without 
reference to particular pupils, and when all our energy 
is taxed to get through our day's teaching, and our ani- 
mal spirits jaded by having to keep order and exact at- 
tention among veritable schoolboys who do not answer 
in all respects to " the young " of the theories. But 
whilst admitting most heartily the difference here, as 
elsewhere, between the actual and the ideal, I think that 
the dull prose of school-teaching would be less dull and 
less prosaic if our aim was higher, and if we did not con- 
tentedly assum.e that our present performances are as 
good as the nature of the case will admit of. Many 
teachers (I think I might say most) are discontented 
with the greater number of their pupils, but it is not so- 
usual for teachers to be discontented with themselves. 

Use of Theories in Education. And yet even those who 
are most averse from theoretical views, which they call 
unpractical, would admit, as practical men, that their 
methods are probably susceptible of improvement, and 
that even if their methods are right, they themselves 
are by no means perfect teachers. Only let the desire 
of improvement once exist, and the teacher will find a 



FESTALOZZI. 203 



new interest in his work. In part, tlie treadmill-like 
monotony so wearing to the spirits will be done away, 
and he will at times have the encouragement of con- 
scious progress. To a man thus minded, theorists may 
be of great assistance. His practical knowledge .may, 
indeed, often show him the absurdity of some pompously 
enunciated principle, and even where the principles 
seem sound, he may smile at the applications. But the 
theorists will show him many aspects of his profession, 
and will lead him to make many observations in it, 
which would otherwise have escaped him. They will 
save him from a danger caused by the difficulty of get- 
ting anything done in the school-room, the danger of 
thinking more of means than ends. They will teach 
him to examine what his aim really is, and then whether 
he is using the most suitable methods to accomplish it. 

Such a theorist is Pestalozzi. He points to a high 
ideal, and bids us measure our modes of education by it. 
Let us not forget that if we are practical men we are 
Christians, and as such the ideal set before us is the 
highest of all. *' Be ye perfect, even as your Father in 
heaven is perfect.^'* 

* Raumer reckons up the services Pestalozzi did for education 
as follows: "He compelled the scholastic world to revise the 
whole of their task, to reflect on the nature and destiny of man, 
and also on the proper way of leading him from his youth toward 
that destiny." Those who wish to study Pestalozzi and his 
works will find a mass of information, thrown together without 
any apparent attempt at method, in Henry Barnard's Pestalozzi 
and Pestalozzianism. New York, 1859. This volume contains 
Tilleard's translation of Raumer's Pestalozzi, excerpted from the 
Geschichte der Padagogik, and published in this country. Besides 



204 £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS, 



VIII. 

JACOTOT. 

Joseph Payne on Jacotot. Of the inventors of peculiar 
methods at present known to me, by far the most im- 

this, Barnard gives us sketches of Pestalozzi's principal assistants, 
a translation of Lienhard und Oertrud, and long extracts from 
Jais other writings. I have used chiefly Barnard and Dr. Biber's 
Life, also article by Palmer in C. A. Schmid's Encyclopadie. 
An important work (according to Barnard, I have not seen it my- 
self) is R. Christoffel's Pesialozzis Leben und Ansichten in wm'tge- 
treuen Auszugen seiner gesammten Scliriften. Zurich, 1847. The 
little volume of Letters on Early Education addressed toMr. Greams, 
was last published in the Phaiiix Library. I have made many 
quotations from these letters above, and will conclude with this 
striking passage : ** Whenever we find a human being in a state 
of suffering, and near to the awful moment which is forever to 
close the scene of his pains and enjoyments in this world, we feel 
ourselves moved by a sympathy which reminds us, that, however 
low his earthly condition, here too there is one of our race, sub- 
ject to the same sensations of alternate joy and grief — born with 
the same faculties — with the same destination, and the same hopes 
of immortal life. And as we give ourselves up to that idea, we 
would fain, if we could, alleviate his sufferings, and shed a ray 
of light on the darkness of his parting moments. This is a feel- 
ing which will come home to the heart of every one — even to the 
young and the thoughtless, and to those little used to the sight of 
woe. Why, then, we would ask, do we look with a careless in- 
difference on those who enter life ? why do we feel so little inter- 
est in the condition of those who enter upon that varied scene, 
of which we might contribute to enhance the enjoyments, and to 



J A CO TOT. 205 



portant, in my judgment, is Jacotot; and if I were not 
well aware how small an interest English teachers take 
in Didactics, I should be much surprised that in this 
country his writings and achievements have received so 
little attention. It is satisfactory to find, however, that 
last year some papers on the subject were read at the 
College of Preceptors by Mr. Joseph Payne, one of the 
Vice-presidents, and were afterward published in the 
*' Educational Times.^' * These papers, which will not, 
I hope, be suffered to lie buried in the pages of a peri- 
odical, contain the only good account of Jacotot I have 
met with, though having long been impressed with the 
importance of his ideas, I have at different times con- 
sulted various foreign books about him. 

In the following summary of Jacotot's system, I am 
largely indebted to Mr. Payne, and to him I refer the 
reader for a much more luminous account than my 
shorter space and inferior knowledge of the subject 
enable me to offer. 

Jacotot's Life; His Method of Lecturing at Dijon. 
Jacotot was born at Dijon, of humble parentage, in 1770. 
Even as a boy he showed his preference for ^^ self -teach- 
ing. '^ We are told that he rejoiced greatly in the ac- 
quisition of all kinds of knowledge that could be gained 

diminisli the sum of suffering, of discontent, and wretchedness ? 
And that education might do this, is the conviction of all those 
who are competent to speak from experience. That it ought to 
do as much, is the persuasion, and that it may accomplish it, is 
the constant endeavor of those who are truly interested in the 
welfare of mankind. 
* For June, July, and September, 1867. 



206 ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

by his own efforts, while he steadily resisted what was 
imposed on him by authority. He, however, was early 
distinguished by his acquirements, and at the age of 
twenty-five was appointed sub-director of the Polytech- 
nic school. Some years afterward he became Professor 
of "the Method of Sciences'' at Dijon, and it was here 
that his method of instruction first attracted attention. 
"Instead of pouring forth a flood of information on the 
subject under attention from his own ample stores — 
explaining everything, and thus too frequently supersed- 
ing in a great degree the pupil's own investigation of it 
— Jacotot, after a simple statement of the subject, with 
its leading d ivisions, boldly started it as a quarry for the 
class to hunt down, and invited every member to take part 
in the chase."* All were free to ask questions, to raise 
objections, to suggest answers. The Professor himself 
did little more than by leading questions put them on 
the right scent. He was afterward Professor of Ancient 
and Oriental Languages, of Mathematics, and of Eoman 
Law ; and he pursued the same method, we are told, 
with uniform success. 

Jacotot' s Enthusiastic Reception at Louvain. Being 
compelled to leave France as an enemy of the Bourbons, 
he was appointed, in 1818, when he was forty-eight 
years old, to the Professorship of the French Language 
and Literature at the University of Louvain. The cele- 
brated teacher w^as received with enthusiasm, but he 

* There is a singular coincidence even in metaphor between 
Mr. Payne's account of Jacotot's mode of instructing this class 
and Mr. Wilson's directions for teaching science. {Essays on a 
Liberal Education. ) 



J A CO TOT. 207 



soon met with an unexpected difficulty. Many mem^ 
bers of his large class knew no language but the Flemish 
and Dutch, and of these he himself was totally ignorant. 
He was, therefore, forced to consider how to teach with- 
out talking to his pupils. The plan he adopted was as 
follows : — He gave the young Flemings copies of Fene- 
lon^s '^ Telemaque/^ with the French on one side, and a 
Dutch translation on the other. This they had to study 
for themselves, comparing tlie two languages, and learn- 
ing the French by heart. They were to go over the 
same ground again and again, and as soon as possible 
they were to give in French, however bad, the substance 
of those parts which they had not yet committed to 
memory. This method was found to succeed marvel- 
ously. Jacotot attributed its success to the fact that the 
students had learnt eyitirely oy the efforts of their own 
mi?ids, and that, though working under his superintend- 
ence, they had been, in fact, their own teachers. Hence 
he proceeded to generalize, and by degrees arrived at a 
series of astounding paradoxes. These paradoxes at first 
did their work well, and made noise enough in the 
world, but Jacotot seems to me like a captain, who, in 
his eagerness to astonish his opponents, takes on board 
such heavy guns as eventually must sink his own ship. 

Learning Dependent on Will Power. ''All human 
beings are equally capable of learning " said Jacotot. 
Others had said this before ; but no teacher, I suppose, 
of more than a fortnight^s experience, had ever believed 
it. The truth which Jacotot chose to throw into this 
more than doubtful form, may perhaps be expressed by 
saying that the student^s power of learning depends, in 



208 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

a great measure, on his icill, and that where there is no- 
will there is no capacity. 

Jacotot's Paradox. ^^ Every one can teach; and, more- 
over, can teach that which he does not Tcnow himself." I 
believe this paradox is the property of Jacotot alone. It 
seems, on the face of it, so utterly absurd, that it seldom 
answers the purpose of a paradox — seldom draws atten- 
tion to the truth of which it is a partial, or a perverted,. 
or an exaggerated statement. The answer which Ja- 
cotot and his friends made to the scoffs of the unbeliev- 
ing, was an appeal to facts. Jacotot, they said, not 
only taught French without any means of communi- 
cating with his pupils, but he also taught drawing and 
music, although quite ignorant on those subjects. With- 
out the least wishing to discredit the honesty of the wit- 
nesses who make this assertion, I can only admit the 
fact with great qualifications. 

The Paradox Examined. Let us ask ourselves, what 
is the meaning of the assertion that we can teach what 
we do not know? First of all, we have to get rid of 
some ambiguity in the meaning of the word teach. To 
teach, according to Jacotot's idea, is to cause to learn. 
Teaching and learning are therefore correlatives : where 
there is no learning there can be no teaching. But this 
meaning of the word only coincides partially with the 
ordinary meaning. We speak of the lecturer or preacher 
as teaching when he gives his hearers an opportunity of 
learning, and do not say that his teaching ceases the 
instant they cease to attend. On the other hand, we 
do not call a parent a teacher because he sends his boy 
to school, and so causes him to learn. The notion of 



J A CO TOT. 209 



teaching, then, in the minds of most of us, includes 
giving information, or showing how an art is to be per- 
formed, and we look upon Jacotot's assertion as absurd, 
because we feel that no one can give information which 
he does not possess, or show how anything is to be done 
if he does not himself know. But let us take the Jaco- 
totian definition of teaching — causing to learn — and then 
see how far a person can cause another to learn that of 
which he himself is ignorant. 

Three Great Classes of Subjects. Subjects which are 
taught may be divided into three great classes : — 1, 
facts; 2, reasonings, or generalization from facts, i.e., 
science ; 3, actions which have to be performed by the 
learner, i.e., arts. 

1. We learn some facts by what the Pestalozzians call 
intuition, i.e., by direct experience. It may be as well 
to make the number of them as large as possible. No 
doubt there are no facts which are hnown so perfectly as 
these. For instance, a boy who has tried to smoke, 
knows the fact that tobacco is apt to produce nausea, 
much better than another who has picked up the infor- 
mation at second-hand. An intelligent master may 
suggest experiments, even in matters about which he 
himself is ignorant, and thus, in Jacotot's sense, he 
teaches things which he does not know. But some facts 
can not be learnt in this way, and then a Newton is 
helpless either to find them out for himself, or to teach 
them to others without knowing them. If the teacher 
does not know in what county Tavistock is, he can only 
learn from those who do, and the pupils will be no clev- 
erer than their master. Here, then, I consider that 



210 i:SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Jacotot's pretensions utterly break down. " No/' the 
answer is ; " the teacher may give the pupil an atlas, 
and direct the boy to find out for himself ; thus the 
master will teach what he does not know/' But, in this 
case, he is a teacher only as far as he knows. For what 
he does not know, he hands over the pupil to the maker 
of the map, who communicates with him, not orally, but 
by ink and paper. The master's ignorance is simply an 
obstacle to the boy's learning ; for the boy would learn 
sooner the position of Tavistock, if it were shown him 
on the map. ^^ That's the very point," says the disciple 
of Jacotot. *■' If the boy gets the knowledge without 
any trouble, he is likely to forget it again directly. 
^Lightly come, lightly go.' Moreover, his faculty of 
observation will not have been exercised." It may, 
indeed, be well not to allow the knowledge even of facts 
to come too easily ; though I doubt whether the difficul- 
ties which arise from the master's ignorance will gen- 
erally be the most advantageous. Still there is obviously 
a limit. If we gave boys their lessons in cipher, and of- 
fered a prize to the first decipherer, one would probably 
be found at last, and meantime all the boys' powers of 
observation, etc., would have been cultivated by com- 
paring like signs in different positions, and guessing at 
their meaning : but the boj^s' time might have been 
better employed. Many eminent authorities consider 
that the memory is assisted by dictionary work, but all 
are agreed that, at least in the case of beginners, the 
outlay of time is too great for the advantage obtained. 

How to Teach a Language one does not Know. Jaco- 
tot's plan of teaching a language which the master did 



JACOTOT. 211 



not know, was to put a book with, say, ^'^ Arma vinim- 
que cano/' etc., on one side, and "I sing arms and the 
man,^' etc., on the other, and to require the pupil to 
puzzle over it till he found which word answered to 
which. I contend that in this case the teacher was the 
translator ; and though from the roundabout way in 
which the knowledge was communicated the pupil de- 
rived some benefit, the benefit was hardly sufficient to 
make up for the expenditure of time involved. 

I hold, then, that Jacotot did not teach facts of which 
he was ignorant, except in tlie sense in which the parent 
who sends his boy to school may be said to teach him. 
All Jacotot did was to direct the pupil to learn, some- 
times in a very awkward fashion, from somebody else.* 

In Science the Student should Discover the Principles. 
When we come to science, we find all the best authori- 
ties agree that the pupil should be led to principles, 
if possible, and not have the principles brought to him. 
Mr. Wilson of Eugby, Professor Tyndall, Mr. H. Spencer, 
have all spoken eloquently on this subject, and shown 
how valuable scientific teaching is, when thus conducted, 
in drawing out the faculties of the mind. But although 
a schoolboy may be led to great scientific discoveries by 
any one who knows the road, he will have no more chance 
of making them with an ignorant teacher, than he would 
have had in the days of the Ptolemies. Here again, then, 
I can not understand how the teacher can teach what 



* Here Jacotot's notion of teaching reminds one of the sophism 
quoted by Montaigne — "A Westphalia ham makes a man drink. 
Drink quenches thirst. Therefore a Westphalia ham quenches 
thirst." 



212 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

he does not know. He may, indeed, join his pupil in 
investigating principles, but he must either keep with 
the pupil or go in advance of him. In the first case he- 
is only a fellow-pupil ; in the second, he teaches only that 
which he knows. 

The Teacher must Know how the Arts should be Per- 
formed. Finally, we come to arts, and we are told that 
Jacotot taught drawing and music, without being either 
a draughtsman or a musician. In art everything depends 
on rigidly directed practice. The most consummate artist 
cannot communicate his skill, and is often inferior as a 
teacher to one whose attention is more concentrated on 
the mechanism of the ai't. Perhaps it is not even neces- 
sary that the teacher should be able to do the exercises 
himself, if only he knows how they should be done ; but 
he seldom gets credit for this knowledge, unless he can 
show that he knows how the thing should be done, by 
doing it. Lessing tells us that Raphael would have been 
a great painter even if he had been born without hands. 
He would not, however, have succeeded in getting man- 
kind to believe it. I grant then that the teacher of art 
need not be a first-rate artist, and, in some very excep- 
tional cases, need not be an artist at all ; but, if he can- 
not perform the exercises he gives his pupil, he must at 
least hnO'W how they should be done. But Jacotot claims 
perfect ignorance. 

The Necessity for Instruction. We are told that he 
'^taught'' drawing by setting objects before his pupils, 
and making them imitate them on paper as best they 
could. Of course the art originated in this way, and a 
person with great perseverance, and (I must say, in spite 



JACOTOT. 213 



of Jacotot) with more than average ability, would make 
considerable progress with no proper instruction ; but 
he would lose much by the ignorance of the person call- 
ing himself his teacher. An awkward habit of holding 
the pencil will make skill doubly difficult to acquire, 
and thus half his time might be wasted. Then, again, 
he would hardly have a better eye than the Oimabues 
and Bellinis of early art, so the drawing of his landscape 
would not be less faulty than theirs. To consider music. 
I am told that a person who is ignorant of music can 
teach, say, the piano or the violin. This assertion, I con- 
fess, seems to me to go beyond the region of paradox 
into that of utter nonsense. In music, talent often sur- 
mounts all kinds of difficulties ; but it would have taxed 
the genius of Mozart himself to become a good player on 
the violin and piano, without being shown how to stop 
and finger.* 

I have thus carefully examined Jacotot^s pretensions 
to teach what he did not know, because I am anxious 
that what seems to me the rubbish should be cleared 
away from his principles, and should no longer con- 
ceal those parts of his system which are worthy of gen- 
eral attention. 



* This assertion is probably too strong. Mozart would have 
learnt to play (and he could only have played well) on the violin 
and piano, if he had been shut up by himself with those instru- 
ments. But he would not have learnt so rapidly or so well as if 
he had been shown how to set to work. His fingering would 
always have been clumsy : he would have been hampered by a bad 
mechanism in his violin playing, and he would have had a wretched 
*' bow -arm." 



214 ESSAYS O.V EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS, 

The Best Teaching is Wise Superintendence of the? 
Learning Process. At the root of Jacotot's Paradox lay 
a truth of very great importance. The highest and best 
teaching is not that which makes the pupils passive re- 
cipients of other people^s ideas (not to speak of the 
teaching which conveys mere words without any ideas at 
all), but that which guides and encourages the pupils in 
working for themselves and thinking for themselves. 
The master, as Mr. Payne well says, can no more think, 
or practice, or see for his pupil, than he can digest for 
him, or walk for him. The pupil must owe everything 
to his own exertions, which it is the function of the 
master to encourage and direct. Perhaps this may seem 
very obvious truth, but obvious or not it has been very 
generally neglected. 

Didactic Teaching. The Jesuits, who were the best 
masters of the old school, did little beyond communicat- 
ing facts, and insisting on their pupils committing these 
facts to memory. Their system of lecturing has indeed 
now passed away, and boys are left to acquire facts from 
school-books instead of from the master. But this change 
is merely accidental. The essence of the teaching still 
remains. Even where the master does not confine him- 
self to hearing what the scholars have learnt by heart, he 
seldom does more than offer explanations. He measures 
the teaching rather by the amount which has been put 
before the scholars — by what he has done for them and 
shown them — than by what they have learned. But this 
is not teaching of the highest type. When the votary of 
Dullness in the ^^Dunciad" is rendering an account of 
his services, he arrives at this climax. 



JACOTOT, 215 



For thee explain a thing till all men doubt it, 
And write about it. Goddess, and about it. 

And in the same spirit Mr. Wilson stigmatizes as synony- 
mous '^the most stupid and most didactic teaching.*' 

Education should Consider what Children already Pos- 
sess. All the eminent authorities on education have a 
very different theory of the teacher's function. '^ Edu- 
cation," says Pestalozzi, " instead of merely considering 
what is to be imparted to children, ought to consider 
first what tliey already possess, not merely their devel- 
oped faculties, but also their innate faculties capable of 
development.'' The master's attention, then, is not to 
be fixed on his own mind and his own store of knowl- 
edge, but on his pupil's mind and on its gradual expan- 
sion. He must, in fact, be not so much a teacher as a 
trainer. Here we have the view which Jacotot intended 
to enforce by his paradox ; for we may possibly train 
faculties which we do not ourselves possess. Sayers' 
trainer brought up his man to face Heenan, but he could 
not have done so himself. The sportsman trains his 
pointer and his hunter to perform feats which are alto- 
gether out of the range of his own capacities. Now, * ^train- 
ing is the cultivation bestowed on any set of faculties 
with the object of developing them" (Wilson), and to 
train any faculty, you must set it to work. Hence it fol- 
lows, that as boys' minds are not simply their memories, 
the master must aim at something more than causing his 
pupils to remember facts. Jacotot has done good service 
to education by giving prominence to this truth, and by 
showing in his method how other faculties may be culti- 
vated besides the memory. 



2l6 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

All is in All — All Knowledge is Connected. " Tout est 
dans tout" {^^ All is in all"), is another of Jacotot's para- 
doxes. I do not propose discussing it as the philosophical 
thesis which takes other forms, as " Every man is a mi- 
crocosm," etc., but merely to inquire into its meaning as 
applied to didactics. 

If you asked an ordinary Frenchman who Jacotot 
was, he would probably answer, Jacotot was a man who 
thought you could learn everything by getting up Fene- 
lon's ^' Telemaque" by heart. By carrying your investi- 
gation further, you would find that this account of him 
required modification, that the learning by heart was 
only part, and a very small part, of what Jacotot de- 
manded from his pupils, but you would also find that 
entire mastery of ^^Telemaque" was his first requisite, 
and that he managed to connect everything he taught 
with that "model-book." Of course, if "tout est dans 
tout," everything is in "Telemaque;" and, said an ob- 
jector, also in the first book of "Telemaque," and in the 
first word. Jacotot went through a variety of subtilities 
to show that all "Telemaque" is contained in the word 
Calypso, and perhaps he would have been equally suc- 
cessful, if he had been required to take only the first 
letter instead of the first word. The reader is amused 
rather than convinced by these discussions, but he finds 
them not without fruit. They bring to his mind very 
forcibly a truth to which he has hitherto probably not 
paid sufficient attention. He sees that all knowledge is 
connected together, or (what will do equally well for our 
present purpose) that there are a thousand links by which 
we may bring into connection the different subjects of 



jACoroT. 217 



knowledge. If by means of these links we can attach in 
our minds the knowledge we acquire to the knowledge 
we alread}^ possess, we shall learn faster and more intelli- 
gently, and at the same time we shall have a much better 
chance of retaining our new acquisitions. The memory, 
as we all know, is assisted even by artificial association 
of ideas, much more by natural. Hence the value of 
^'^tout est dans tout," or, to adopt a modification sug- 
gested by Mr. Payne, of the connection of knowledge. 
Suppose we know only one subject, but know that thor- 
ough!}^, our knowledge, if I may express myself alge- 
braically, cannot be represented by ignorance plus the 
knowledge of that subject. AVe have acquired a great 
deal more than that. When other subjects come before 
us, they may prove to be so connected with what we had 
before, that we may almost seem to know them already. 
In other words, Avhen we know a little thoroughly, 
though our actual possession is small, we have poten- 
tially a great deal more. 

Learn Something Thoroughly; Refer Everything to 
That. Jacotot^s practical application of his ^^ tout est dans 
tout" was as follows: ^'Ilfaut a'pprendre quelque chose, 
et y rapporter tout le reste." ('^ The pupil must learn 
something thoroughly, and refer everything to that.") 
For language he must take a model book, and become 
thoroughly master of it. His knowledge must not be a 
verbal knowledge only, but he must enter into the sense 
and spirit of the writer. Here we find that Jacotot's 
practical advice coincides with that of many other great 
authorities, who do not base it on the same principle. 
The Jesuits' maxim was, that their pupils should always 



2l8 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

learn something thoroughly, however little it might be. 
Pestalozzi, as I have mentioned, insisted on the children 
going over the elements again and again till they were 
completely master of them. " Not only/^ says he, " have 
the first elements of knowledge in every subject the most 
important bearing on its complete outline; but the child V 
confidence and interest are gained by perfect attainment 
even in the lowest stage of instruction/' Ascham, 
Katich, and Comenius all required a model-book to be 
read and re-read till words and thoughts were firmly fixed 
in the pupil's memory. Jacotot probably never read 
Ascham's " Schoolmaster." If he had done so, he might 
have appropriated some of Ascham's words as exactly 
conveying his own thoughts. Ascham, as we saw, rec- 
ommended that a short book should be thoroughly mas- 
tered, each lesson being worked over in different ways 
a dozen times at the least. " Thus is learned easily, 
sensibly, by little and little, not only all the hard con- 
gruities of grammar, the choice of aptest words, the 
right framing of words and sentences, comeliness of fig- 
ures, and forms fit for every matter and proper for every 
tongue ; but that which is greater also — in marking daily 
and following diligently thus the best authors, like in- 
vention of arguments, like order in disposition, like ut- 
terance in elocution, is easily gathered up ; whereby your 
scholar shall be brought not only to like eloquence, but 
also to all true understanding and right judgment, both 
for writing and speaking.'' The voice seems Jacotot's 
voice, though the hand is the hand of Ascham. 

Jacotot makes Great Demands on the Memory. But if 
Jacotot agrees so far with earlier authorities, there is^ 



JACOTOT. 219 



one point in which he seems to differ from them. He 
makes great demands on the memory, and requires six 
books of " Telemaque " to be learned by heart. On the 
other hand, Montaigne said, " To know by heart is to not 
know ;" which is echoed by Rousseau, H. Spencer, etc. 
Ratich required that nothing should be learnt by heart. 
Protests against " loading the memory,^' " saying without 
book," etc., are everywhere to be met with, and nowhere 
more vigorously expressed than in Ascham. He says of 
the grammar school boys of his time, " that their whole 
knowledge, by learning without the book, was tied only 
to their tongue and lips, and never ascended up to the 
brain and head, and therefore was soon spit out of the 
mouth again. They learnt without book everything, 
they understood within the book little or nothing. ^^ 
But these protests were really directed at verbal knowl- 
edge, when it is made to take the place of knowledge of 
the thing signified. We are always too ready to suppose 
that words are connected with ideas, though both old 
and young are constantly exposing themselves to the sar- 
casm of Mephistopheles : — 

. . . eben wo Begriffe f ehlen, 

Da stellt eia Wort zur rechten Zeit sich ein.* 

Danger of Empty Words Guarded Against. Against 
this danger Jacotot took special precautions. The pupil 
was to undergo an examination in everything connected 
with the lesson learnt, and the master's share in the 

* . . . just where meaning fails, a word 
Comes patly in to serve your turn. 

Theodoi^e MartiivS Tram. 



220 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

work was to convince himself, from the answers he re- 
ceived,, that the pupil thoroughly grasped the meaning, 
as well as remembered the words, of the author. Still 
the six books of " Telemaque," which Jacotot gave to be 
learnt by heart, was a very large dose, and Mr. Payne 
is of opinion that he would have been more faithful to 
his own principles if he had given the first book only. 

Three Ways to Study the Model Book. There are 
three ways in which the model book may be studied. 
1st. It may be read through rapidly again and again, 
which was Ratich^s plan and Hamilton's ; or, 2d, each 
lesson may be thoroughly mastered, read in various ways 
a dozen times at the least, which was Ascham's plan ; 
or, 3d, the pupil may begin always at the beginning, 
and advance a little further each time, which was Ja- 
cotot's plan. This last could not, of course, be carried 
very far. The repetitions, when the pupil had got on 
some way in the book, could not always be from the be- 
ginnmg ; still every part was to be repeated so fre- 
quently that nothing could le forgotten. 

But not all Learning is to be Remembered ; Power is Ac- 
quired. Jacotot did not wish his pupils to learn simply in 
order to forget, but to learn in order to remember forever. 
" We are learned,'^ said he, " not so far as we have learned, 
but only so far as we remember." He seems, indeed, 
almost to ignore the fact that the act of learning serves 
other purposes than that of making learned, and to as- 
sert that to forget is the same as never to have learned, 
which is a palpable error. We necessarily forget much 
that passes through our minds, and yet its effect re- 
mains. All grown people have arrived at some opinions, 



JACOTOT. 221 



convictions, knowledge, but they cannot call to mind 
every spot they trod on in the road thither. When we 
have read a great history, say, or traveled through a 
fresh country, we have gained more than the number of 
facts we happen to remember. The mind seems to have 
formed an acquaintance with that history or that coun- 
try, which is something different from the mere acqui- 
sition of facts. Moreover, our interests, as well as our 
ideas, may long survive the memory of the facts which 
originally started them. We are told that one of the old 
judges, when a barrister objected to some dictum of his, 
put him down by the assertion, ^^Sir, I have forgotten 
more law than ever you read." If he wished to make 
the amount forgotten a measure of the amount remem- 
bered, this was certainly fallacious, as the ratio between 
the two is not a constant quantity. But he may have 
meant that this extensive reading had left its result, and 
that he could see things from more points of view than 
the less traveled legal vision of his opponent. That poiuer 
acquired by learning may also last longer than the knowl- 
edge of the thing learned is sufficiently obvious. 

Various Ends in Studying. The advantages derived 
from having learned a thing are, then, not entirely lost 
when the thing itself is forgotten. This leads me to 
speak, though at the risk of a digression, on the present 
state of opinion on this matter. In setting about the 
study of any subject, we may desire (1) the knowledge 
of that subject ; or (2) the mental vigor derivable from 
learning it ; or (3) we may hope to combine these ad- 
vantages. Xow, in spite of the aphorism which con- 
nects knowledge and power together, we find that these 



222 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

have become the badges of opposite parties. One party- 
would make knowledge the end of education. Mr. 
Spencer assumes as a law of nature that the study which 
conveys useful knowledge must also give mental vigor, 
so he considers that the object of education should be 
to impart useful knowledge, and teach us in what way to 
treat the body, to treat the mind, to manage our affairs, 
to bring up a fam^ily, to behave as a citizen, etc., etc. 
The old school, on the other hand, which I may call the 
English party, as it derives its strength from some of 
the peculiar merits and demerits of the English charac- 
ter, heartily despises knowledge, and would make the 
end of education power only. 

Power the Sole End of Study ; Illustrated by Typical 
Cambridge Man. As the most remarkable outcome of 
this idea of education, we have the Cambridge mathe- 
matical tripos. 

The typical Cambridge man studies mathematics, not 
because he likes mathematics, or derives any pleasure 
from the perception of mathematical truth, still less with 
the notion of ever using his knowledge ; but either be- 
cause, if he is '^a good man," he hopes for a fellowship, 
or because, if he cannot aspire so high, he considers 
reading the thing to do, and finds a satisfaction in men- 
tal effort just as he does in a constitutional to the Gog- 
magogs. When such a student takes his degree, he is 
by no means a highly cultivated man ; but he is not the 
sort of a man we can despise for all that. He has in 
him, to use one of his own metaphors, a considerable 
amount oi force, which may be applied in any direction. 
He has great power of concentration and sustained men- 



J A CO TOT. 223 



tal effort even on subjects which are distasteful to him. 
In other words, his mind is under the control of his will, 
and he can bring it to bear promptly and vigorously on 
anything put before him. He will sometimes be half 
through a piece of work, while an average Oxonian (as 
we Cambridge men conceive of him at least) is thinking 
about beginning. But his training has taught him to 
value mental force without teaching him to care about 
its application. Perhaps he has been working at the 
gymnasium, and has at length succeeded in ^^ putting 
up " a hundredweight. In learning to do this, he has 
been acquiring strength for its own sake. He does not 
want to put up hundredweights, but simply to be able 
to put them up, and his reward is the consciousness of 
power. Now the tripos is a kind of competitive exami- 
nation in putting up weights. The student who has 
been training for it, has acquired considerable mental 
vigor, and when he has put up his weight he falls back 
on the consciousness of strength which he seldom thinks 
of using. Having put up the heavier, he despises the 
lighter weights. He rather prides himself on his igno- 
rance of such things as history, modern languages, and 
English literature. He '■'■ can get those up in a few even- 
ings," whenever he wants them. He reminds me, in- 
deed, of a tradesman who has worked hard to have a 
large balance at his banker's. This done, he is satisfied. 
He has neither taste nor desire for the things which 
make wealth valuable ; but when he sees other people 
in the enjoyment of them, he hugs himself with the 
consciousness that he can write a check for such things 
whenever he pleases. 



224 ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

This Theory not wholly Satisfactory. I confess that 
this outcome of the English theory of education does 
not seem to me altogether satisfactory. But we have, 
as yet, no means of judging what will be the outcome 
of the other theory which makes knowledge the end of 
education. Its champions confine themselves at present 
to advising that a variety of sciences be taught to boys, 
and maintain a rather perplexing silence as to how to 
teach them. Mr. Spencer, as we have seen, requires 
that a boy should be taught how to behave in every re- 
lation of manhood, and he also tells us how to teach — 
elementary geometry. Still these advocates of knowl- 
edge are acquiring a considerable amount of influence, 
and there seems reason to fear lest halting between the 
two theories, our education, instead of combining knowl- 
edge and power, should attain to neither. 

Old-fashioned School-teaching gave Power. Our old- 
fashioned school-teaching, confined as it was to a gram- 
matical drill in the classical languages, did certainly 
give something of the power which comes from concen- 
trated effort. The Eton Latin Grammar does not in- 
deed seem to me a well-selected model-book, but many 
a man has found the value of knowing even that book 
thoroughly. Now, however, a cry has been raised for 
useful information. It is shameful, we are told, that a 
boy leaving school should not know the names of the 
capitals of Europe, and should never have heard of the 
Habeas Corpus and the Bill of Rights, etc., etc. The 
schoolmaster is beginning to give way. He admits 
homoeopathic doses of geographical, historical, and sci- 
entific epitomes and of modern languages: and perhaps- 



JACOTOT. 225 



between these stools the unhicky schoolboy will come to 
the ground; his accurate knowledge of Latin grammar 
will be exchanged for " some notion " of a variety of 
things, and in the end his condition will be best de- 
scribed by varying a famous sarcasm, and saying, that 
if he knew a little of good hard work, he would know a 
little of everything. 

Knowledge not Power ; this Unsatisfactory also. The 
reader will by this time begin to suspect that I am an 
educational Tory after all, even a reactionary Tory. 
This I deny, but I am probably not free from those 
prejudices which beset Englishmen, especially Cam- 
bridge men and schoolmasters, and I confess I look 
with dismay on the effort which is being made to intro- 
duce a large number of subjects into our school-course, 
and set up knowledge rather than power as the goal of 
education.* 

Knowledge and Power. But cannot these be com- 
bined ? May we not teach such subjects as shall give 
useful knowledge and power too ? On this point the 
philosopher and the schoolmaster are at issue. The 
philosopher says, It is desirable that we should have the 
knowledge of such and such sciences — therefore teach 
them. The schoolmaster says, It may be desirable to 

* In this matter the testimony of Lord Stanley is very valu- 
able. "If teaching is, as I believe, better on the whole in the 
higher than in the lower classes [of society] it is chiefly on this 
account — not that more is taught at an early age, but less ; that 
time is taken, that the wall is not run up in haste; that the bricks 
are set on carefully, and the mortar allowed time to dry. And 
so the structure, whether high or low, is likely to stand. " (From 
* speech reported in the Evening Mail, December 9, 1864.) 



226 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

know those sciences, but boys can not learn them. The 
knowledge acquired by boys will never be very valuable 
in itself. We must, therefore, consider it a means 
rather than an end. We must think first of mental 
discipline; for 'this boys must thoroughly master what 
they learn, and this thoroughness absolutely requires 
that the young mind should be applied to very few sub- 
jects; and, though we are quite ready to discuss which 
subjects afford the best mental training, we can not 
allow classics to be thrust out till some other subjects 
have been proved worthy to reign in their stead. 

The Real Weakness of Modern Education. Unless I 
am mistaken, the true ground of complaint against the 
established education is, that it fails to give, not knowl- 
edge, but the desire of knowledge. A literary educa- 
tion which leaves no love of reading behind, can not be 
considered entirely successful. 

As I have said elsewhere, I would admit a natural 
science into the curriculum in order to give the mind 
some training in scientific processes, and some interest 
in scientific truth. I would also endeavor to cultivate a 
fondness for English literature * and the fine arts; but, 
whatever the subject taught, I consider that, for edu- 
cational purposes, the power and the desire to acquire 
knowledge, are to be valued far before knowledge itself. 

How does this conclusion .bear upon the matter I set 
out with, the function of memory in education? 

* The claims of English literature in education have been 
urged by Professor Seeley with a force which seems to me irre- 
sistible (See Macmillan's Magazine for November, 1867.) 



JACOTOT. 227 



Which Facts are the Most Worth Remembering? 

Classicists, scientific men, and all others, are agreed 
about the value of memory, and must therefore desire 
that its powers should not be squandered on the learn- 
ing of facts which, for want of repetition, will be soon 
lost, or facts which will prove of little value if retained. 
But in estimating facts, we must think rather of their 
educational value than of their bearing upon after-life. 
We must make the memory a storehouse of such facts 
as are good material for the other powers of the mind 
to work with, and, that the facts may serve this pur- 
pose, they must be such as the mind can thoroughly 
grasp and handle, and such as may be connected to- 
gether. "To instruct, ^^ as Mr. Payne reminds us, is 
instruere, " to put together in order, to build or con- 
struct'' We must be careful, then, not to cram the 
mind with isolated, or as Mr. Spencer calls them, unor- 
gaiiizaUe facts — such facts, e.g., as are taught to young 
ladies.* 

* I do not pretend myself to have fathomed the mystery of 
ivhat is taught to young ladies, but I follow the best authorities 
on the subject. "'I can not remember the time,' said Maria 
Bertram, ' when 1 did not know a great deal that Fanny has not 
the least notion of yet. How long ago is it, aunt, since we used 
to repeat the chronological order of the kings of England, with 
the dates of their accessions, and most of the principal events of 
their reigns?' 'Yes,' added Julia, ' and of the Roman emperors 
as low as Severus, besides a great deal of the heathen mythology, 
and all the metals, semi-metals, planets, and distinguished phi- 
losophers.' * Very true, indeed, my dears,' replied the aunt, ' but 
you are blessed with wonderful memories. . . . Remember that if 
you are ever so forward and clever yourselves, you should al- 



122S ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Unorganizable Knowledge. A great deal of onr chil- 
dren's memory is wasted in storing facts of this kind^, 
which can never form part of any organism. We do not. 
teach them geography {earth-lcnowUdgey as the Germans 
call it), but the names of places. Our ^' history" is a 
similar, though disconnected study. AYe leave our 
children ignorant of the land, but insist on their getting 
up the "land-marks." And, perhaps, from a latent 
perception of the uselessness of such work, neither 
teachers nor scholars ever think of these things as learnt 
to be remembered. Latin grammar is gone through 
again and again, and a boy feels that the sooner he gets 
it into his head, the better it will be for him; but wha 
expects that the lists of geographical and historical 
5iames which are learnt one half-year, will be remem- 
bered the next ? I have seen it asserted, that when a boj 
leaves school, he has already forgotten nine-tenths of 
what he has been taught, and I dare say that estimate 
is quite within the mark. 

By adopting the principles of Jacotot, we shall avoid 
a great deal of this waste. We shall give some thorough 
knowledge, with which fresh knowledge may be con- 
nected. 

What Perfect Understanding is; Advantages of Thor- 
ough Knowledge. Perfect familiarity with a subject is 

ways be modest; for, much as you know already, there is a greait 
deal more for you to learn.' 'Yes, I know there is,' said Julia;, 
"• till I am seventeen.'" (Miss Austen's 3fansjield Park.) And,, 
fortunately for the human race, the knowledge vanishes away as 
soon as that grand climacteric is passed, though perhaps we must 
•regret that often nothing but she«r vacuity is left in its place. 



J A CO TOT. 229 



tsomethiug beyond the mere understanding it, and being 
able, with difficulty, to reproduce what we have learned. 
A Cambridge man, getting up book-work for the tripos, 
does not indeed attempt to learn it by heart, without 
understanding it ; but when his mind has thoroughly 
mastered the steps of the reasoning, he goes over it 
again and again, till he uses, in fact, hardly any faculty 
but his memory in writing it out. If he has to think 
during the operation, he considers that piece of book- 
work not properly got up.* By thus going over the 
same thing again and again, we acquire a thorough 
command over our knowledge, and the feeling perfectly 
at hom-e, even within narrow borders, gives a conscious- 
ness of strength. An old adage tells us that the Jack- 
of -all- trades is master of none; but the master of one 
trade will have no difficulty in extending his insight 

*As an instance of the use of memory in mathematics, and 
also of the power acquired by perfect attainment, I may mention 
a case which came under my own observation. A " three days" 
man, not by any means remarkable for mathematical ability, 
had got up the book- work of his subjects very exactly, but had 
never done a problem. In the three days' problem paper, to his 
no small surprise, he got out several of them. A friend who 
was afterward a good wrangler, ventured to doubt his having 
done a particular problem. "It came out very easily, " said the 
three days' man, "from such and such a formula." " You a'-e 
right," said the wrangler, "I worked it out in a much more 
<jlumsy way myself, 1 never thought of that formula," I may 
mention here a fact which, whether it is a propos or not, will be 
interesting to musicians. The late Professor Walmisley, of Cam- 
Jiridge, told me that when his godfather Attwood was Mozart's 
pupil, Mozart always had Bach's Forty-eight Preludes and 
Fugues on his piano, and hardly played anything else. 



230 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

and capacity beyond it. To use an illustration, which 
is of course an illustration merely, I would kindle 
knowledge in children, like fire in a grate. A stupid 
servant, with a small quantity of wood, spreads it over 
the whole grate. It blazes away, goes out, and is simply 
wasted. Another, vfho is wiser or more experienced, 
kindles the whole of the wood at one spot, and the fire, 
thus concentrated, extends in all directions. Thus 
would I concentrate the beginning of knowledge, and 
although I could not expect to make much show for a. 
time, I should trust that afterward the fire would ex- 
tend, almost of its own accord. 

Jacotot's Four Commands. I proceed to give Jaco- 
tot's directions for carrying out the rule, " II faut ap- 
prendre quelque chose, et y rapporter tout le reste.''' 
(Learn one thing well; refer everjrthing to that.) 

1. Learn — i.e., learn so as to know thoroughly,, 
perfectly, immovably {i.mijerturl)a'blement), as well six 
months or twelve months hence, as now — somethin'G- 
— something which fairly represents the subject to be 
acquired, which contains its essential characteristics^ 

2. Kepeat that "something" incessantly {sans cesse),, 
i.e., every day, or very frequently, from the beginnings 
without any omission, so that no part may be forgotten, 

3. Eeflect upon the matter thus acquired, so as by de- 
grees to make it a possession of the mind as well as of 
the memory, so that, being appreciated as a whole, and 
appreciated in its minutest parts, what is as yet un- 
known, may be referred to it and interpreted by it. 

4. Verify, or test, general remarks, e.g., grammatical 
ruleS; etc., made by others, by comparing them with the 



J A CO TOT. 231 



facts (i.e., the words and phraseology) which you have 
learnt yourself.* 

Jacotot's jStTethod of Teaching Reading and Writing. 
In conclusion, I will give some account of the way in 
which reading, writing, and the mother-tongue were 
taught on the Jacototian system. 

The teacher takes a book, says Edgeworth's ^'^ Early 
Lessons,^' points to the first word, and names it, 
" Frank.^' The child looks at the word and also pro- 
nounces it. Then the teacher does the same with the 
first two words, " Frank and ;" then with the three first, 
*' Frank and Robert,^' etc. When a line or so has 
been thus gone over, the teacher asks which word is 
Robert ? What word is that (pointing to one) ? ' Find 
me the same word in this line ' (pointing to another 
part of the book). When a sentence has been thus 
acquired, the words already known are analyzed into 
syllables, and these S3^11ables the child must pick out 
elsewhere. Finally, the same thing is done with let- 
ters. When the child can read a sentence, that sen- 
tence is put before him written in small-hand, and the 
child is required to copy it. When he has copied the 
first word, he is led, by the questions of the teacher, to 
see how it differs from the original, and then he tries 
again. The pupil must always correct himself, guided 
only by questions. This sentence must be worked at 
till the pupil can write it pretty well from memory. 
He then tries it in larger characters. By carrying out 
this plan, the children's powers of observation and 

* I take this paragraph verbatim from Mr. Payne. 



232 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

making comparisons are strengthened, and the arts of 
reading and writing are said to be very readily ac- 
quired. 

How he Taught the Mother-tongue. For the mother- 
tongue, a model-book is chosen and thoroughly learned. 
Suppose " Easselas" is selected. ^' The pupil learns by 
heart a sentence, or a few sentences, and to-morrow 
adds a few more, still repeating from the beginning. 
The teacher, after two or three lessons of learning and 
repeating, takes portions — any portion — of the matter, 
and submits it to the crucible of the pupil's mind: — 
"Who was Easselas ? Who was his father ? What is the 
father of waters ? Where does it begin its course ? 
Where is Abyssinia ? Where is Egypt ? Where was 
Easselas placed ? What sort of a person was Easselas ? 
What is 'credulity?' What are the 'whispers of fancy,' 
^the promises of youth,' etc.? What was there peculiar 
in the position of Easselas ? Where was he confined ? 
Describe the valley. How would you have liked to live 
there? Why so? Why not? etc." 

A great variety of written exercises is soon joined with 
the learning by heart. Pieces must be written from 
memory, and the spelling, pointing, etc., corrected by 
the pupil himself from the book. The same piece must 
be written again and again, till there are no mistakes to 
correct. ''This," says Mr. Payne, who has himself 
taught in this way, "is the best plan for spelling that 
has been devised." Then the pupil may write an analy- 
sis, may define words, distinguish between synonyms, 
explain metaphors, imitate descriptions, write imaginary 
dialogues or correspondence between the characters, etc. 



JACOTOT. 233 



Besides these, a great variety of grammatical exercises 
may be given, and the force of prefixes and affixes may 
be found out by the pupils themselves, by collection and 
comparison. '^The resources even of such a book as 
* Rasselas,' " says Mr. Payne, ^' will be found all but ex- 
haustless, while the training which the mind undergoes 
in the process of thoroughly mastering it, the acts of 
analysis, comparison, induction, and deduction^ per- 
formed so frequently as to become a sort of second 
nature, can not but serve as an excellent preparation for 
the subsequent study of English literature." 

This Method an Imitation of Self -teaching ; the Method 
of Investigation. We see, from these instances, how 
Jacotot sought to imitate the method by which young 
children and self-taught men teach themselves. All 
such proceed from objects to definitions, from facts to 
reflections and theories, from examples to rules, from 
particular observations to general principles. They 
pursue, in fact, however unconsciously, the metliod of 
investigation, the advantages of which are thus set out 
in a passage from Burke's treatise on the Sublime and 
Beautiful : — 

'^I am convinced," says he, "that the method of 
teaching which approaches most nearly to the method of 
investigation is incomparably the best; since, not content 
with serving up a few barren and lifeless truths, it leads 
to the stock on which they grew; it tends to set the 
reader [or learner] himself in the track of invention, and 
to direct him into those paths in which the author has 
made his own discoveries." 

''For Jacotot, I think the claim may, without pre- 



234 £SSAVS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

sumption, be maintained, that lie has, beyond all other 
teachers, succeeded in co-ordinating the method of 
elementary teaching with the method of investigation^' 
(Payne). 

Activity of Jacotot's Last Years. The latter part of 
his life, which did not end till 1840, Jacotot spent in his 
native country — first at Valenciennes, and then at Paris. 
To the last he labored indefatigably, and with a noble 
disinterestedness, for what he believed to be the ** in- 
tellectual emancipation" of his fellow-creatures. For a 
time, his system made great way in France, but the 
practices introduced by it were probably unworthy of its 
principles, and have been abandoned. The University 
of France, in 1852, recommended more attention to its 
principles : but I have not observed any reference ta 
Jacotot in Mr. Arnold's recent report. 



IX. 

HERBERT SPENCER. 

Who are Competent to Discuss Educational Questions. 

I once heard it said by a teacher of great ability that no 
one without practical acquaintance with the subject 
could write anything worth reading on Education. My 
own opinion differs very widely from this. I am not^ 
indeed, prepared to agree with another authority, much 
given to paradox, that the actual work of education un- 



HERBERT SPENCER. 235 

fits a man for forming enlightened views about it, but I 
till Ilk that the outsider, coming fresh to the subject, and 
unincumbered by tradition and prejudice, may hit upon 
truths which the teacher, whose attention is too much 
engrossed with practical difficulties, would fail to per- 
ceive without assistance, and that, consequently, the 
theories of intelligent men, unconnected with the work 
of education, deserve our careful, and, if possible, our 
impartial consideration. 

Herbert Spencer's " Education." One of the most im- 
portant works of this kind which has lately appeared, is 
the treatise of Mr. Herbert Spencer. So eminent a 
writer has every claim to be listened to with respect, and 
in this book he speaks with more than his individual 
authority. The views he has very vigorously propounded 
are shared by a number of distinguished scientific men ; 
and not a few of the unscientific believe that in them is 
shadowed forth the education of the future. 

His Controversial Tone. It is perhaps to be regretted 
that Mr. Spencer has not kept the tone of one who in- 
vestigates the truth in a subject of great difficulty, but 
lays about him right and left, after the manner of a 
spirited controversialist. This, no doubt, makes his 
book much more entertaining reading than such treatises 
usually are, but, on the other hand, it has the disadvan- 
tage of arousing the antagonism of those whom he would 
most wish to influence. When the man who has no 
practical acquaintance with education, lays down the law 
ex cathedra, garnished with sarcasm at all that is now 
going on, the schoolmaster, offended by the assumed 
tone of authority, sets himself to show where these theo- 



236 £SSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

ries would not work, instead of examining what basis of 
truth there is in them, and how far they should influence 
his own practice. 

I shall proceed to examine Mr. Spencer's proposals 
with all the impartiality I am master of. 

Is Science Most Valuable for Discipline ? The great 
question, whether the teaching which gives the most 
Taluable knowledge is the same as that which best dis- 
ciplines the faculties of the mind, Mr. Spencer dismisses 
briefly. ^' It would be utterly contrary to the beautiful 
economy of nature," he says, " if one kind of culture 
were needed for the gainiug of information, and another 
kind were needed as a mental gymnastic." But it seems 
to me that different subjects must be used to train the 
faculties at different stages of development. The proc- 
esses of science, which form the staple of education in 
Mr. Spencer's system, can not be grasped by the intel- 
lect of a child. " The scientific discoverer does the work, 
and when it is done the schoolboy is called in to witness 
the result, to learn its chief features by heart, and to 
repeat them when called upon, just as he is called on to 
name the mothers of the patriarchs, or to give an ac- 
count of the Eastern campaigns of Alexander the Great. '^ 
{Pall Mall Gazette, Feb. 8, 1867.) This, however, af- 
fords but scanty training for the miud. We want to 
draw out the child's interests, and to direct them to 
worthy objects. We want not only to teach him, but to 
enable and encourage him to teach himself; and, if fol- 
lowing Mr. Spencer's advice, we make him get up the 
species of plants ^^ which amount to some 320,000," and 
the varied forms of animal life, which are " estimated at 



HERBERT SPENCER. 237 

some 2,000,000/' we may, as Mr. Spencer tells us, have 
strengthened his memory as effectually as by teaching 
him languages; but the pupil will, perhaps, have no 
great reason to rejoice over his escape from the horrors 
of the "^^ As in Praesenti," and ^' Propria quse Maribus/* 
The consequences will be the same in both cases. We 
shall disgust the great majority of our scholars with the 
acquisition of knowledge, and with the use of the pow- 
ers of their mind. "Whether, therefore, we adopt or re- 
ject Mr. Spencer's conclusion, that there is one sort of 
knowledge which is universally the most valuable, I think 
we must deny that there is one sort of knowledge which 
is universally, and at every stage in education, the best 
adapted to develop the intellectual faculties. Mr. Spen- 
cer himself acknowledges this elsewhere. ''There is,'' 
says he, "a certain sequence in which the faculties spon- 
taneously develop, and a certain kind of knowledge, 
which each requires during its development. It is for 
us to ascertain this sequence, and supply this knowl- 
edge. " 

"Which Knowledge is of Most "Worth. ? Mr. Spencer 
discusses more fully ''the relative value of knowledges,'* 
and this is a subject which has hitherto not met with 
the attention it deserves. It is not sufficient for us to 
prove of any subject tanght in our schools that the 
knowledge or the learning of it is valuable. We must 
also show that the knowledge or the learning of it is of 
at least as great value as that of anything else that might 
be taught in the same time. " Had we time to master 
all subjects we need not be particular. To quote the old 
song — 



238 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Could a man be secure 

That his life would endure, 

As of old for a thousand long years, 

What things he might know! 

What deeds he might do! 

And all without hurry or care I 

But we that have but span-long lives must ever bear ip 
mind our limited time for acquisition." 

What is the Test of the Worth of Any Subject ? To 
test the value of the learning imparted in education we 
must look to the end of education. This Mr. Spencer 
defines as follows : ^^To prepare us for complete living, 
is the function which education has to discharge, and 
the only rational mode of judging of an educational 
course is to judge in wliat degree it discharges such 
function." For complete living we must know "in 
what way to treat the body; in what way to treat the 
mind; in what way to manage our affairs; in what way 
to bring up a family; in what way to behave as a citizen; 
in what way to utilize those sources of happiness which 
nature supplies — how to use all our faculties to the 
greatest advantage of ourselves and others." There are 
a number of sciences, says Mr. Spencer, which throw 
light on these subjects. It should, therefore, be the 
business of education to impart these sciences. 

But, if there were (which is far from being the case) a 
well-defined and well-established science in each of these 
departments, those sciences would not be understandable 
by children, nor would any individual have time to mas- 
ter the whole of them, or even "a due proportion of 
each." The utmost that could be attempted would be 



HERBERT SPENCER. 239 

to give young people some knowledge of the results of 
such sciences and the rules derived from them. But to 
this Mr. Spencer would object that it would tend, like 
the learning of languages, '''to increase the already 
nndue respect for authority. '^ 

Nature Attends to Direct Self-preservation. To con- 
sider Mr. Spencer^s divisions in detail, we come first to 
knowledge that leads to self-preservation : 

''Happily, that all-important part of education which 
goes to secure direct self-preservation, is, in part, already 
provided for. Too momentous to be left to our blun- 
dering, Nature takes it into her own hands. ^^ But Mr. 
Spencer warns us against such thwartings of Nature as 
that by which ''stupid schoolmistresses commonly pre- 
yent the girls in their charge from the spontaneous 
physical activities they would indulge in, and so render 
them comparatively incapable of taking care of them- 
selves in circumstances of peril. ^' 

Would Knowledge of Physiology Prolong Life? In- 
direct self-preservation, Mr. Spencer believes, may be 
much assisted by a knowledge of physiology. "Dis- 
eases are often contracted, our members are often in- 
jured, by causes which superior knowledge would avoid/' 
I believe these are not the only grounds on which the 
advocates of physiology urge its claim to be admitted 
into the curriculum; but these, if they can be estab- 
lished, are no doubt very important. It is true, how- 
ever, that doctors preserve their own life and health by 
their knowledge of physiology. I think the matter is 
open to dispute. Mr. Spencer does not. He says very 
truly, that many a man would blush if convicted of ig- 



240 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

norance about tlie pronunciation of Iphigenia, or about 
the labors of Hercules, who, nevertheless, would not 
scruple to acknowledge that he had never heard of the 
Eustachian tubes, and could not tell the normal rate of 
pulsation. ^^So terribly,"^ adds Mr. Spencer, "in our 
education does the ornamental override the useful V 
But this is begging the question. At present classics 
form part of the instruction given to every gentleman,, 
and physiology does not. This is the simpler form of 
Mr. Spencer^s assertion about the labors of Hercules, 
and the Eustachian tubes, and no one denies it. But 
we are not so well agreed on the comparative value of 
these subjects. In his Address at St. Andrews, Mr. 
Mill showed that he at least was not convinced of the 
uselessness of classics, and Mr. Spencer does not tell us 
how the knowledge of the normal state of pulsation is 
useful ; how, to use his own test, "it influences action.^^ 
However, whether we admit the claims of physiology or 
not, we shall probably allow that there are certain physi- 
ological facts and rules of health, the knowledge of 
which would be of great practical value, and should 
therefore be imparted to every one. Here the doctor 
should come to the schoolmaster's assistance, and give 
him a manual from which to teach them. 

Knowledge which Helps to Gain a Living. Next in 
order of importance, according to Mr. Spencer, comes 
the knowledge which aids indirect self-preservation by 
facilitating the gaining of a livelihood. Here Mr. 
Spencer thinks it necessary to prove to us that such 
sciences as mathematics and physics and biology under- 
lie all the practical arts and business of life. No one 



HERBERT SPENCER. 24 1 

will think of joining issue with him on this point ; but 
the question still remains, what influence should this 
have on education? " Teach science," says Mr. Spencer. 
" A grounding in science is of great importance, both, 
because it prepares for all this [business of life], and 
because rational knowledge has an immense superiority 
over empirical knowledge." Should we teach all sciences 
to everybody? This is clearly impossible. Should we, 
then, decide for each child what is to be his particular 
means of money-getting, and instruct him in those 
sciences which will be most useful in that business or 
profession? In other words, should we have a separate 
school for each calling? The only attempt of this kind 
which has been made is, I believe, the institution of 
Handelschulen (commercial schools) in Germany. In 
them, youths of fifteen or sixteen enter for a course of 
two or three years^ instruction which aims exclusively 
at fitting them for commerce. But, in this case, their 
general education is already finished. With us, the lad 
commonly goes to work at the business itself quite as 
soon as he has the faculties for learning the sciences 
connected with it. If the school sends him to it with a 
love of knowledge, and with a mind well disciplined to 
acquire knowledge, this will be of more value to him 
than any special information. 

The Money-value of Science. As Mr. Spencer is here 
considering science merely with reference to its impor- 
tance in earning a livelihood, it is not beside the question 
to remark, that in a great number of instances, the 
knowledge of the science which underlies an operation 
confers no practical ability whatever. ]^o one sees the 



242 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

l)etter for understanding the structure of the eye and 
the undulatory theory of light. In swimming and row- 
ing, a senior wrangler has no advantage oyer a man who 
is entirely ignorant about the laws of fluid pressure. As 
far as money-getting is concerned, then, science will not 
be found to be universally serviceable. Mr. Spencer 
gives instances, indeed, where science would prevent 
very expensive blundering : but the true inference is, 
not that tlie blunderers should learn science, but that 
they should mind their own business, and take the 
opinion of scientific men about theirs. ""Here is a 
mine,^' says he, ^^in the sinking of which many share- 
holders ruined themselves, from not knowing that a 
certain fossil belonged to the old red sandstone, below 
which no coal is found. ''^ Perhaps they were misled by 
the little learning which Pope tells us is a dangerous 
thing. If they had been entirely ignorant, they would 
surely have called in a professional geologist, whose 
opinion would have been more valuable than their own, 
€ven though geology had taken the place of classics in 
their schooling. '^ Daily are men induced to aid in 
carrying out inventions which a mere tyro in science 
could show to be futile.^' But these are men whose 
function it would always be to lose money, not make it, 
whatever you might teach them.* I have great doubt, 
therefore, whether the learning of sciences will ever be 
found a ready way of making a fortune. 

* " The brewer," as Mr. Spencer himself tells us, "if his busi- 
ness is very extensive, finds it pay to keep a chemist on the 
premises" — pay a good deal better, I suspect, than learning 
chemistry at school. 



HERBERT SPENCER. 243 

Superiority of Eational Knowledge to Empirical. But 

directly we get beyond the region of pounds, shillings, 
and pence, I agree most cordially with Mr. Spencer that 
a rational knowledge has an immense superiority over 
empirical knowledge. And, as apart of their education 
boys should be taught to distinguish the one from the 
other, and to desire rational knowledge. Much might 
be done in this way by teaching, not all the sciences and 
nothing else, but the main principles of some one science, 
which would enable the more intelligent boys to under- 
stand and appreciate the value of '^ a rational explana- 
tion of phenomena." I believe this addition to what 
was before a literary education has already been made 
in some of our leading schools, as Harrow, Eugby, and 
the City of London.* 

Knowledge of How to Eear Offspring. Next, Mr. 
Spencer would have instruction in the proper way of 
rearing offspring form a part of his curriculum. There 
<3an be no question of the importance of this knowledge, 
and all that Mr. Spencer says of the lamentable igno- 

* Mr. Helps, who by taste and talent is eminently literary, put 
in this claim for science more than twenty years ago. "The 
higher branches of method can not be taught at first; but you may 
begin by teaching orderliness of mind. Collecting, classifying, 
contrasting, and weighing facts are some of the processes by 
which method is taught. . . . Scientific method may be acquired 
without many sciences being learnt; but one or two great 
branches of science must be accurately known." {Friends in 
Council, Education.) Mr. Helps, though by his delightful style 
he never gives the reader any notion of over-compression, has 
told us more truth about education in a few pages than one some' 
ttimes meets with in a complete treatise. 



244 ASSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS, 

ranee of parents is, unfortunately, no less undeniable. 
But could this knowledge be imparted early in life? 
Young people would naturally take but little interest irt 
it. It is by parents, or at least by those who have some^ 
notion of the parental responsibility, that this knowledge 
should be sought. The best way in which we can teach 
the young will be so to bring them up that, when they 
themselves have to rear children, the remembrance of 
their own youth may be a guide and not a beacon to 
them. But more knowledge than this is necessary, and 
I differ from Mr. Spencer only as to the proper time for 
acquiring it. 

How to Train for Citizenship. Next comes the knowl- 
edge which fits a man for the discharge of his functions 
as a citizen, a subject to which Dr. Arnold attached 
great importance at the time of the first Reform Bill,, 
and which deserves our attention all the more in conse- 
quence of the second. But what knowledge are we Xo- 
give for this purpose ? One of the subjects which seem 
especially suitable is history. But history, as it is now 
written, is, according to Mr. Spencer, useless. '^ It 
does not illustrate the right principles of political action." 
" The great mass of historical facts are facts from which 
no conclusions can be drawn — unorganizable facts, and,, 
therefore, facts of no service in establishing principles of 
conduct, which is the chief use of facts. Read them if 
you like for amusement, but do not flatter yourself they 
are instructive." About the right principles of political 
action we seem so completely at sea that, perhaps, the 
main thing we can do for the young is to point out ta 
them the responsibilities which will hereafter devolve 



HERBERT SPENCER. 245 

upon them, and the clanger, both to the state and tlie 
individual, of just echoing the popular cry, without the 
least reflection, according to our present usage. 

Bearing of the Study of History. But history, as it is 
now written by great historians, may be of some use in. 
training the young both to be citizens and men. ^^ Bead- 
ing about the fifteen decisive battles, or all the battles in 
history, would not make a man a more judicious voter at 
the next election," says Mr. Spencer. But is this true ? 
The knowledge of what has been done in other times, 
€ven by those whose coronation renders them so distaste- 
ful to Mr. Spencer, is knowledge which influences a 
man^s whole character, and may, therefore, affect par- 
ticular acts, even when we are unable to trace the con- 
nection. As it has been often said, the effect of reading 
history is, in some respects, the same as that of traveling. 
Any one in Mr. Spencer^s vein might ask, **^ If a man 
has seen the Alps, of what use will that be to him in 
weighing out groceries ?" Directly, none at all; but in- 
directly, much. The traveled man will not be such a 
slave to the petty views and customs of his trade as the 
man who looks on his county town as the center of the 
universe. The study of history, like traveling, widens 
the student's mental vision, frees him, to some extent, 
from the bondage of the present, and prevents his mis- 
taking conventionalities for laws of nature. It brings 
home to him, in all its force, the truth that " there are 
also people beyond the mountain " that there are higher 
interests in the world than his own business concerns 
and nobler men than himself, or the best of his acquaint- 
ance. It teaches him what men are capable of, and 



246 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

thus gives him juster views of his race. And to have all 
this truth worked into the mind contributes, perhaps, 
as largely to ^^ complete living" as knowledge of the 
Eustachian tubes, or of the normal rate of pulsation.* 

Educational Importance of History and Biography. I 
think, therefore, that the works of great historians and 
biographers, which we already possess, may be usefully 
employed in education. It is difficult to estimate the 
value of history according to Mr. Spencer's idea, as it 
has yet to be written; but I venture to predict that if 
boys, instead of reading about the history of nations in 
connection with their leading men, are required to study 
only " the progress Jof societj^," the subject will at once 
lose all of its interest for them ; and, perhaps, many of 
the facts communicated will prove, after all, no less 
unorganizable than the fifteen decisive battles. 

Education for Hours of Leisure. Lastly, we come to 
that " remaining division of human life which includes 
the relaxations and amusements filling leisure hours."" 
Mr. Spencer assures us that he will yield to none in the 
value he attaches to aesthetic culture and its pleasures; 
but if he does not value the fine arts less, he values 

';; * Mr. Mill (who, by the way, would leave history entirely to 
private reading, Address at Si. Andreios, p. 21) has pointed out 
that " there is not a fact in history which is not susceptible of as 
many different explanations as there are possible theories of 
human affairs," and that "history is not the foundation but the 
verification of the social science." But he admits that " what we 
know of former ages, like what we know of foreign nations, is, 
-with all its imperf ectness, of much use, by correcting the narrow- 
ness incident to personal experience." (Dissertations, vol. i., p,. 
112.) 



HERBERT SPENCER. 247 

science more; and painting, music, and poetry would 
receive as little encouragement under his dictatorship as 
in the days of the Commonwealth. " As the fine arts 
and belles-lettres occupy the leisure part of life, so should 
they occupy the leisure part of education." This lan- 
guage is rather obscure; but the only meaning I can 
attach to it is, that music, drawing, poetry, etc., may be 
taught if time can be found when all other knowledges 
are provided for. This reminds me of the author whose 
works are so valuable that they will be studied when 
Shakespeare is forgotten — but not before. Any one of 
the sciences which Mr. Spencer considers so necessary 
might employ a lifetime. Where, then, shall we look for 
the leisure part of education when education includes 
them all ?* 

* It is difficult to treat seriously the arguments by which Mr.. 
Spencer endeavors to show that a knowledge of science is neces- 
sary for the practice or the enjoyment of the fine arts. Of course, 
the highest art of every kind is based on science, that is, on truths 
which science takes cognizance of and explains ; but it does not 
therefore follow that " without science there can be neither per- 
fect production nor full appreciation." Mr. Spencer tells us of 
mistakes which John Lewis and Rossetti have made for want of 
science. Very likely ; and had those gentlemen devoted much 
of their time to science we should never have heard of their 
blunders — or of their pictures either. If they were to paint a 
piece of woodwork, a carpenter might, perhaps, detect something 
amiss in the mitering. If they painted a wall, a bricklayer 
might point out that with their arrangement of stretchers and 
headers the M'^all would tumble down for want of a proper bond. 
But even Mr. Spencer would not wish them to spend their time 
in mastering the technicalities of every handicraft, in order to 
avoid these inaccuracies. It is the business of the painter to give 



248 £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

High Value of Drawing, Painting, and Music. But, if 

adopting Mr. Spencer's own measure, we estimate the 
value of knowledge by its influence on action, we shall 
probably rank " accomplishments " much higher than 
they have hitherto been placed in the schemes of educa- 
tionists. Knowledge and skill connected with the busi- 
ness of life are, of necessity, acquired in the discharge 
of business. But the knowledge and skill which make 
our leisure valuable to ourselves, and a source of pleas- 
ure to others, can seldom be gained after the work of 
life has begun. And yet every day a man may benefit 
by possessing such an abilit}^, or may suffer from the 
want of it. One whose eyesight has been trained by 
drawing and painting finds objects of interest all around 
him, to which other people are blind. A primrose by 
the river's brim is, perhaps, more to him who has a feel- 
ing for its form and color than even to the scientific 
student, who can tell all about its classification and com- 

us form and color as they reveal themselves to the eye, not to 
prepare illustrations of scientific text-books. The physical sci- 
ences, however, are only part of the painter's necessary acquire- 
ments, according to Mr. Spencer. "He must also understand 
how the minds of spectators will be affected by the several pecu- 
liarities of his work — a question in psychology ! " Still more 
surprising is Mr. Spencer's dictum about poetry. "Its rhythm, 
its strong and numerous metaphors, its hyperboles, its violent in- 
versions, are simply exaggerations of the traits of excited speech. 
To be good, therefore, poetry must pay attention to those laws of 
nervous action which excited speech obeys." It is difficult to 
see how poetry can pay attention to anything. The poet, of 
course, must not violate those laws, but, if he has paid attention 
to them in composing, he will do well to present his MS. to the 
local newspaper. 



HERBERT SPENCER. 249 

ponent parts. A knowledge of music is often of the 
greatest practical service, as by virtue of it, its possessor 
is valuable to his associates, to say nothing of his having 
a constant source of pleasure and a means of recreation 
which is most precious as a relief from the cares of life. 
Of far greater importance is the knowledge of our best 
poetry. One of the first reforms in our school-course 
would have been, I should have thought, to give this 
knowledge a much more prominent 'place ; but Mr. 
Spencer consigns it, with music and drawing, to " the 
leisure part of education.^' Whether a man who was 
engrossed by science, who had no knowledge of the fine 
arts except as they illustrated scientific laws, no ac- 
quaintance with the lives of great men, or with any his- 
tory but sociology, and who studied the thoughts and 
emotions expressed by our great poets merely with a 
view to their psychological classification — whether such 
a man could be said to "live completely ^^ is a question 
to which every one, not excepting Mr. Spencer himself, 
would probably return the same answer. And yet this 
is the kind of man which Mr. Spencer's system would 
produce where it was most successful. 

Summary of Conclusions — Study of Science not a Uni- 
versal Remedy. Let me now briefly sum up the con- 
clusions arrived at, and consider how far I differ from 
Mr. Spencer. I believe that there is no one study which 
is suited to train the faculties of the mind at every stage 
of its development, and that when we have decided on 
the necessity of this or that knowledge, we must con- 
sider further what is the right time for acquiring it. 1 
believe that intellectual education should aim, not so 



250 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

much at communicating facts, however valuable, as at 
showing the boy what true knowledge is, and giving 
him the power and the disposition to acquire it. I be- 
lieve that the exclusively scientific teaching which Mr» 
Spencer approves would not effect this. It would lead 
at best to a very one-sided development of the mind. It 
might fail to engage the pupil^s interest sufficiently to 
draw out his faculties, and in this case the net outcome 
of his schooldays would be no larger than at present. 
Of the knowledges which Mr. Spencer recommends for 
special objects some, I think, would not conduce to the 
object, and some could not be communicated early in 
life. 

Spencer's Pive Classes of Knowledges. (1.) For indi- 
rect self-preservation we do not require to know physi- 
ology, but the results of physiology. (2.) The science 
which bears on special pursuits in life has not in many 
cases any pecuniary value, and although it is most desir- 
able that every one should study the science which 
makes his work intelligible to him, this must usually be 
done when his schooling is over. The school will have 
done its part if it has accustomed him to the intellectual 
processes by which sciences are learned, and has given 
him an intelligent appreciation of their value.* (3.) 

* Speaking of law, medicine, engineering, and the industrial 
arts, Mr. Mill remarks : " Whether those whose specialty they 
are will learn them as a branch of intelligence or as a mere trade, 
and whether, having learnt them, they will make a wise and 
conscientious use of them, or the reverse, depends less on the 
manner in which they are taught their profession, than upon 
what sort of mind they bring to it — w7iat kind of intelligence and of 



HERBERT SPENCER. 25 I 

The right way of rearing and training children should 
be studied indeed, but not by the children themselves. 
(4.) The knowledge which fits a man to discharge his 
duties as a citizen is of great importance, and, as Dr. 
Arnold pointed out, is likely to be entirely neglected by 
those who have to struggle for a livelihood. The school- 
master should, therefore, by no means neglect this sub- 
ject with those of his pupils whose schooldays will soon 
be over, but, probably, all that he can do is to cultivate 
in them a sense of the citizen's duty, and a capacity for 
being their own teachers. * (5.) The knowledge of 
poetry, belles-lettres, and the fine arts, which Mr. Spencer 
hands over to the leisure part of education, is the only 
knowledge in his programme which I think should most 
certainly form a prominent part in the curriculum of 
every school. 

But the Relative Value of Knowledges Important. I 
therefore differ, though with great respect, from the 
conclusions at which Mr. Spencer has arrived. But I 
heartily agree with him that we are bound to inquire 
into the relative value of knowledges, and if we take, as I 
should willingly do, Mr. Spencer's test, and ask how does 
this or that knowledge influence action (including in our 
inquiry its influence on mind and cliaracter, through 
which it bears upon action), I think we should banish 
from our schools much that has hitherto been taught in 
them, besides those old tormentors of youth (laid, I fancy, 
at last — requiescant in pace), (may they rest in peace) — 

coTiscience the general system of education has developed in them." — 
Address at St. Andrews, p. 6. 
* Vide Mill.— Address, p. 67. 



252 £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

the Propria qucB Maribus (which are proper to men) 
and its kindred absurdities. What we should teach is, of 
course, not so easily decided as what we should not. 

Spencer on Intellectual Education. I now come to 
consider Mr. Spencer's second chapter, in which, under 
the heading of "Intellectual Education,^' he gives an 
admirable summing up of the main principles in which 
the great writers on the subject have agreed, from Co- 
menius downward. These principles are, perhaps, not all 
of them unassailable, and even where they are true, many 
mistakes must be expected before we arrive at the best 
method of applying them; but the only reason that can 
be assigned for the small amount of influence they have 
hitherto exercised is, that most teachers are as ignorant 
of them as of the abstrusest doctrines of Kant and 
Hegel. 

The Science of Education yet to be Developed. In 
stating these principles Mr. Spencer points out that they 
merely form a commencement for a science of education. 
'' Before educational methods can be made to harmonize 
in character and arrangement with the faculties in the 
mode and order of unfolding, it is first needful that we 
ascertain with some completeness how the faculties do 
unfold. At present we have acquired on this point only 
a few general notions. These general notions must be 
■developed in detail — must be transformed into a multi- 
tude of specific propositions before we can be said to pos- 
sess that scie7ice on which the art of education must be 
based. And then, when we have definitely made out in 
what succession and in what combinations the mental 
powers become active, it remains to choose out of the 



HERBERT SPENCER. 253 

many possible wa3^s of exorcising each of them, that 
which best conforms to its natural mode of action. Evi- 
dently, therefore, it is not to be supposed that even our 
most advanced modes of teaching are the right ones, or 
nearly the right ones." 

Latin and Greek no longer to have an Exclusive Place 
in Education. It is not to be wondered at that we have 
no science of education. Those who have been able to 
observe the phenomena have had no interest in general- 
izing from them. Up to the present time the school- 
master has been a person to whom boys were sent to 
learn Latin and Greek. He has had, therefore, no more 
need of a science than the dancing-master. But the 
present century, which has brought in so many changes, 
will not leave the state of education as it found it. 
Latin and Greek, if they are not dethroned in our 
higher schools, will have their despotism changed for 
a very limited monarcy. A course of instruction cer- 
tainly without Greek and perhaps without Latin will 
have to be provided for middle schools. Juster views 
are beginning to prevail of the schoolmaster's function. 
It is at length perceived that he has to assist the develop- 
ment of the human mind, and, perhaps by-and-by, he 
may think it as well to learn all he can of that which 
he is employed in developing. When matters have ad- 
vanced as far as this, we may begin to hope for a science 
of education. In Locke's day he could say of physical 
science that there was no such science in existence. 
For thousands of years the human race had lived in igno- 
rance of the simplest laws of the world it inhabited. 
But the true method of inquiring once introduced, sci- 



254 £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

ence has made such rapid conquests, and acquired so 
great importance, that some of our ablest men seem in- 
clined to deny, if not the existence, at least the value, 
of any other kind of knowledge. So, too, when teachers 
seek by actual observation to discover the laws of mental 
development, a science may be arrived at which, in its 
influence on mankind, would, perhaps, rank before any 
we now possess. 

Those who have read the previous Essays will have 
seen in various forms most of the principles which Mr. 
Spencer enumerates, but I gladly avail myself of his as- 
sistance in summing them up. 

From the Simple to the Complex. 1. We should pro- 
ceed from the simple to the complex, both in our choice 
of subjects and in the way in which each subject is 
taught. We should begin with but few subjects at 
once, and, successively adding to these should finally 
carry on all subjects abreast. 

Each larger concept is made by a combination of 
smaller ones, and presupposes them. If this order is 
not attended to in communicating knowledge, the pupil 
can learn nothing but words, and will speedily sink into 
apathy and disgust. 

That we must proceed from the known to the un- 
known is something more than a corollary to the above;* 
because not only are new concepts formed by the combi- 
nation of old, but the mind has a liking for what it 
knows, and this liking extends itself to all that can be 
connected with its object. The principle of using the 

* Mr. Spencer does not mention this principle in his enumera- 
tion> but, no doubt, considers he implies it. 



HERBERT SPENCER. 255 

known in teaching the unknown is so simple, that all 
teachers who really endeavor to make anything under- 
stood, naturally adopt it. The traveler who is describ- 
ing Avhat he has seen and what we have not seen tells us 
that it is in one particular like this object, and in another 
like that object, with which we are already familiar. 
We combine these different concepts we possess, and so 
get some notion of things about which we were previ- 
ously ignorant. 

Use of the Known should be more Systematic. What 
is required in our teaching is that the use of the known 
should be employed more systematically. Most teach- 
ei's think of boys who have no school learning as entirely 
ignorant. The least reflection shows, however, that 
they know already much more than schools can ever 
teach them. A sarcastic examiner is said to have handed 
a small piece of paper to a student, and told him to 
write all lie hneio on it. Perhaps many boys would have 
no difficulty in stating the sum of their school learning 
within very narrow limits, but with other knowledge a 
child of five years old, could he write, might soon fill a 
volume. Our aim should be to connect the knowledge 
boys bring with them to the school-room with that which 
they are to acquire there. I suppose all will allow, 
whether they think it a matter of regret or otherwise, 
that hardly anything of the kind has hitherto been at- 
tempted. Against this state of things I cannot refrain 
from borrowing Mr. Spencer's eloquent protest. 

Evils of Worshiping the mere Symbols of Knowledge. 
" Not recognizing the truth that the function of books 
is supplementary — that they form an indirect means to 



256 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

knowledge when direct means fail, a means of seeing 
through, other men what you can not see for yourself, 
teachers are eager to give second-hand facts in place of 
first-hand facts. Not perceiving the enormous value of 
that spontaneous education which goes on in early" 
years, not perceiving that a child's restless observation, 
instead of being ignored or checked, should be dili- 
gently ministered to and made as accurate and complete 
as possible, they insist on occupying its eyes and 
thoughts with things that are, for the time being, in- 
comprehensible and repugnant. Possessed by a super- 
stition which worships the symbols of knowledge instead 
of the knowledge itself, they do not see that only when 
his acquaintance with the objects and processes of the 
household, the street, and the fields, is becoming toler- 
ably exhaustive, only then should a child be introduced 
to the new sources of information which books supply, 
and this not only because immediate cognition is of far 
greater value than mediate cognition, but also because 
the words contained in books can be rightly interpreted 
into ideas only in proportion to the antecedent expe- 
rience of things. ^^* While agreeing heartily in the 

* After remarking on the wrong order in which subjects are 
taught, he continues, "What with perceptions unnaturally 
dulled by early thwartings, and a coerced attention to books, 
what with the mental confusion produced by teaching subjects 
before they can be understood, and in each of them giving gen- 
eralizations before the facts of which they are the generalizations, 
what with making the pupil a mere passive recipient of others' 
ideas and not in the least leading him to be an active inquirer or 
self -instructor, and what with taxing the faculties to excess, there 
are very few minds that become as efficient as thej^ might be." 



HERBERT SPENCER. 257 

spirit of this protest, I doubt whetlier we should wait 
till the child's acquaintance with the objects and proc- 
esses of the household, the street, and the fields, is 
becoming tolerably exhaustive before we give him in- 
Btruction from books. The point of time which Mr. 
Spencer indicates is, at all events, rather hard to fix, 
and I should wish to connect book-learning as soon as 
possible with the learning that is being acquired in 
other ways. Thus might both the books, and the acts 
and objects of daily life, win an additional interest. If, 
e.g., the first reading books were about the animals, and 
later on about the trees and flowers which the children 
constantly meet with, and their attention were 
kept up by large colored pictures, to which the 
text might refer, the children would soon find both 
pleasure and advantage in reading, and they would look 
at the animals and trees with a keener interest from the 
additional knowledge of them they had derived from 
books. This is, of course, only one small application of 
a very infiuential principle. 

Error of Teaching Latin Grammar before English. 
One marvelous instance of the neglect of this principle 
is found in the practice of teaching Latin grammar be- 
fore English grammar. Respect for the high authority 
of Professor Kennedy, who would not have English 
grammar taught at all, prevents my expressing myself 
as strongly as I should like in this matter. 

Unscientific Teaching. As Professor Seeley has so 
well pointed out, children bring with them to school the 
knowledge of language in its concrete form. They may 
soon be taught to observe the language they already 



258 ASSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

know, and to find, almost for themselves, some of the 
main divisions of words in it. But, instead of availing 
himself of the child's previous knowledge, the school- 
master takes a new and difficult language, differing as 
much as possible from English, a new and difficult 
science, that of grammar, conveyed, too, in a new and 
difficult terminology; and all this he tries to teach at 
tlie same time. The consequence is that the science is 
destroyed, the terminology is either misunderstood, or, 
more probably, associated with no ideas, and even the 
language for which every sacrifice is made, is found, in 
nine cases out of ten, never to be acquired at all.* 

* A class of boys whom I once took in Latin Delectus denied, 
with the utmost confidence, when I questioned them on the sub- 
ject, that there were any such things in English as verbs and 
substantives. On another occasion, I saw a poor hoy of nine or 
ten caned, because, when he had said that projiciscor vi^as a de- 
ponent verb, he could not say what a deponent verb was. Even 
if he had remembered the inaccurate grammar definition ex- 
pected of him, "A deponent verb is a verb with a passive form 
and an active meaning," his comprehension of proficiscor would 
have been no greater. It is worth observing that, even when 
offending grievously in great matters against the principle of 
connecting fresh knowledge with the old, teachers are sometimes 
driven to it in small. They find that it is better for boys to see 
that lignum is like regnum, and laudare like amare, than simply 
to learn that lignum is of the Second Declension, and laudare of 
the First Conjugation. If boys had to learn, by mere effort of 
memory, the particular declension or conjugation of Latin words 
before they were taught anything about declensions and conju- 
gations, this would be as sensible as the 'method adopted in some 
other instances, and the teachers might urge, as usual, that the 
information would come in useful afterward. 



HERBERT SPENCER. 259 

From the Indefinite to the Definite. 2. ^' All develop- 
ment is an advance from the indefinite to the definite." 

I do not feel very certain of the truth of this princi- 
ple, or of its application, if true. Of course, a child^s 
intellectual conceptions are at first vague, and we should 
not forget this ; but it is rather a fact than a principle. 

From the Concrete to the Abstract. 3. " Our lessons 
ought to start from the concrete, and end in the ab- 
stract." What Mr. Spencer says under this head well 
deserves the attention of all teachers. ^'^ General for- 
mulas which men have devised to express groups of de- 
tails, and which have severally simplified their concep- 
tions by uniting many facts into one fact, they have 
supposed must simplify the conceptions of a child also. 
They have forgotten that a generalization is simple only 
in comparison with the whole mass of particular truths 
it comprehends ; that it is more complex than any one 
of these truths taken simply; that only, after many of 
these single truths have been acquired, does the general- 
ization ease the memory and help the reason; and that, 
to a mind not possessing these single truths, it is neces- 
sarily a mystery.* Thus, confounding two kinds of 
simplification, teachers have constantly erred by setting 
out with ^^ first principles," a proceeding essentially, 
though not apparently, at variance with the primary 
rule [of proceeding from the simple to the complex], 

*" General terms are, as it were, but the indorsements upon 
the bundles of our ideas ; they are useful to those who have col- 
lected a number of ideas, but utterly useless to those who have 
no collections ready for classification." — Edgeworth's Practical 
Education, vol, i. 91. 



25o £SSAVS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

which implies that the mind should be introduced to 
principles through the medium of examples, and so 
should be led from the particular to the general, from 
the concrete to the abstract." In conformity with this 
principle, Pestalozzi made the actual counting of things 
precede the teaching of abstract rules in arithmetic. 
Basedow introduced weights and measures into the 
school, and Mr. Spencer describes some exercise in 
butting out geometrical figures in cardboard as a prep- 
aration for geometry. The difficulty about such 
instruction is that it requires apparatus, and appa- 
ratus is apt to get lost or out of order. But, if ap- 
paratus is good for anything at all, it is worth a 
little trouble. There is a tendency in the minds of 
many teachers to depreciate ^^ mechanical appliances.''" 
Even a decent blackboard is not always to be found in 
our higher schools. But, though such appliances will 
not enable a bad master to teach well, nevertheless, 
other things being equal, the master will teach better 
with them than without them. There is little credit 
due to him for managing to dispense with apparatus. 
An author might as well pride himself on being saving 
in pens and paper. 

Order of the Genesis of Knowledge. 4. '^ The genesis 
of knowledge in the individual must follow the same 
course as the genesis of knowledge in the race." This 
is a thesis on which I have no opinion to offer. It was, 
I believe, first maintained by Pestalozzi. 

From an Experimental Introduction to a Rational 
Knowledge. 5. From the above principle Mr. Spencer 
infers that every study should have a purely experimen- 



HERBERT SPENCER. 26 1 

tal introduction, thus proceeding through an empirical 
stage to a rational. 

Self-development to be Fostered. 6. A second con- 
clusion which Mr. Spencer draws is that, in education, 
the process of self -development should be encouraged 
to the utmost. Children should be led to make their 
own investigations, and to draw their own inferences. 
They should be told as little as possible, and induced 
to discover as much as possible. I quite agree with Mr. 
Spencer that this principle can not be too strenuously- 
insisted on, though it obviously demands a high amount 
of intelligence in the teacher. But if education is to be 
a training of the faculties, if it is to prepare the pupil 
to teach himself, something more is needed than simply 
to pour in knowledge and make the pupil reproduce it. 
The receptive and reproductive faculties form but a 
small portion of a child's powers, and yet the only por- 
tion which many schoolmasters seek to cultivate. It is, 
indeed, not easy to get beyond this point ; but the im- 
pediment is in us, not in the children. "Who can 
watch/' asks Mr. Spencer, '^'^the ceaseless observation, 
and inquiry, and inference, going on in a child's mind, 
or listen to its acute remarks in matters within the 
range of its faculties, without perceiving that these 
powers it manifests, if brought to bear systematically 
upon studies within the same range, would readily mas- 
ter them without help ? This need for perpetual tell- 
ing results from our stupidity, not from the child's. 
We drag it away from the facts in which it is interested, 
and which it is actively assimilating of itself. We put 
before it facts far too complex for it to understand, and 



262 ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

therefore distasteful to it. Finding that it will not vol- 
untarily acquire these facts, we thrust them into its 
mind by force of threats and punishment. By thus de- 
nying the knowledge it craves, and cramming it with 
knowledge it cannot digest, we produce a morbid state 
of its faculties, and a consequent disgust for knowledge 
in general. And when, as a result, partly of the stolid 
indolence we have brought on, and partly of still-con- 
tinued unfitness in its studies, the child can understand 
nothing without explanation, and becomes a mere pas- 
sive recipient of our instruction, we infer that education 
must necessarily be carried on thus. Having by our 
method induced helplessness, we make the helplessness 
a reason for our method." It is, of course, much easier 
to point out defects than to remedy them : but every 
one who has observed the usual indifference of school- 
boys to their work, and the waste of time consequent on 
their inattention, or only half-hearted attention, to the 
matter before them, and then thinks of the eagerness 
with which the same boys throw themselves into the 
pursuits of their play-hours, will feel a desire to get, at 
the cause of this indifference ; and, perhaps, it may seem 
to him partly accounted for by the fact that their school- 
work makes a monotonous demand on a single faculty — 
the memory. 

Instruction must be made Pleasurable. 7. This brings 
me to the last of Mr. Spencer's principles of intellectual 
education. Instruction must excite the interest of the 
pupils, and therefore be pleasurable to them. " Nature 
has made the healthful exercise of our faculties both of 
mind and body pleasurable. It is true that some of the 



HERBERT SPENCER. 263 

highest mental powers as yet but little developed in the 
race, and congeuitally possessed in any considerable de- 
gree only by the most advanced, are indisposed to the 
amount of exertion required of them. Bat these in 
virtue of their very complexity will in a normal course 
of culture come last into exercise, and will, therefore, 
have no demands made on them until the pupil has ar- 
rived at an age when ulterior motives can be brought 
into play, and an indirect pleasure made to counterbal- 
ance a direct displeasure. With all faculties lower than 
these, however, the immediate gratification consequent 
on activity is the normal stimulus, and under good man- 
agement the only needful stimulus. When we have to 
fall back on some other, we must take the fact as evi- 
dence that we are on the wrong track. Experience is 
daily showing with greater clearness that there is always 
a method to be found productive of interest — even of 
delight — and it ever turns out that this is the method 
proved by all other tests to be the right one.^' 

This Principle Generally Eej acted. As far as I have 
had the means of judging, I have found that the ma- 
jority of teachers reject this principle. If you ask them 
why, most of them will tell you that it is impossible to 
make school-work interesting to children. A large 
number also hold that it is not desirable. Let us con- 
sider these two points separately. 

Of course, if it is not possible to get children to take 
interest in anything they could be taught in school, 
there is an end of the matter. But no one really goes 
as far as this. Every teacher finds that some of the 
things boys are taught they like better than others, and 



264 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

perhaps that one boy takes to one subject and another 
to another, and he also finds, both of classes and indi- 
viduals, that they always get on best with what they 
like best. The utmost that can be maintained is, then, 
that some subjects which must be taught will not inter- 
est the majority of the learners. And if it be once ad- 
mitted that it is desirable to make learning pleasant 
and interesting to our pupils, this principle will influ- 
ence us to some extent in the subjects we select for 
teaching, and still more in the methods by which we 
endeavor to teach them. I say we shall be guided to 
some extent in the selection of subjects. There are theo- 
rists who assert that nature gives to young minds a crav- 
ing for their proper aliment, so that they should be 
taught only what they show an inclination for. But 
surely our natural inclinations in this matter, as in 
others, are neither on the one hand to be ignored, nor 
on the other to be uncontrolled by such motives as our 
reason dictates to us. We at length perceive this in the 
physical nurture of our children. Locke directs that 
children are to have very little sugar or salt. '' Sweet- 
meats of all kinds are to be avoided," says he, " which, 
whether they do more harm to the maker or eater, is 
not easy to tell." (Ed. § 20.) Now, however, doctors 
have found out that young people's taste for sweets 
should in moderation be gratified, that they require 
sugar as much as they require any other kind of nutri- 
ment. But no one would think of feeding his children 
entirely on sweetmeats, or even of letting them have an 
unlimited supply of plum-puddings and hardbake. If 
we follow out this analogy in nourishing the mind, we 



HERBERT SPENCER. 26$ 

shall, to some extent, gratify a child's taste for "stories," 
whilst we also provide a large amount of more solid fare. 
But although we should certainly not ignore our chil- 
dren's likes and dislikes in learning, or in anything else, 
it is easy to attach too much importance to them. Dis- 
like very often proceeds from mere want of insight into 
the subject. When a boy has "done" the First Book of 
Euclid without knowing how to judge of the size of an 
angle, or the Second Book without forming any concep- 
tion of a rectangle, no one can be surprised at his not 
liking Euclid. And then the failure which is really due 
to bad teaching is attributed by the master to the stu- 
pidity of his pupil, and by the pupil to the dullness of 
the subject. If masters really desired to make learning 
a pleasure to their pupils, I think they would find that 
much might be done to effect this without any alteration 
in the subjects taught. 

Intellectual Activity not to be Sacrificed to Routine. 
But the present dullness of school-work is not without 
its defenders. They insist on the importance of break- 
ing in the mind to hard work. This can only be done, 
they say, by tasks which are repulsive to it. The school- 
boy does not like, and ought not to like, learning Latin 
grammar any more than the colt should find pleasure in 
running round in a circle: the veiy fact that these 
things are not pleasant makes them beneficial. Perhaps 
a certain amount of such training may train doiu?i the 
mind and qualify it for some drudgery from which it 
might otherwise revolt; but if this result is attained, it is 
attained at the sacrifice of the intellectual activity which 
is necessary for any higher function. As Carlyle says. 



266 ESSAYS OiV EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

when speaking of routine work generally, you want noth- 
ing but a sorry nag to draw your sand-cart; your high- 
spirited Arab will be dangerous in such a capacity. But 
who would advocate for all colts a training which should 
render them fit for nothing but such humble toil ? I 
have spoken elsewhere on this subject, and here I will 
merely express my strong conviction that boys' minds 
are frequently dwarfed, and their interest in intellectual 
pursuits blighted, by the practice of employing the first 
years of their school life in learning by heart things 
which it is quite impossible for them to understand or 
care for. Teachers set out by assuming that little boys 
can not understand anything, and that all we can do 
with them is to keep them quiet and cram them with 
forms which will come in useful at a later age. Wlien 
the boys have been taught on this system for two or 
three years, their teacher complains that they are stupid 
and inattentive, and that so long as they can say a thing 
by heart they never trouble themselves to understand it. 
In other words, the teacher grumbles at them for doing 
precisely what they have been taught to do, for repeat- 
ing words without any thought of their meaning. 

Difference between Theory and Practice. In this very 
important matter I am fully alive to the difference be- 
tween theory and practice. It is so easy to recommend 
that boys should be got to understand and take an in- 
terest in their work — so difficult to carry out the recom- 
mendation! Grown people can hardly conceive that 
words which have in their minds been associated with 
familiar ideas from time immemorial, are mere sounds in 
the mouths of their pupils. The teacher thinks he is 



HERBERT SPENCER. 267 

beginning at the beginning if he says that a transitive 
verb must govei-n an accusative, or that all the angles 
of a square are right angles. He gives his pupils credit 
for innate ideas up to this point, at all events, and ad- 
vancing on this supposition he finds that ho can get 
nothing out of them but memory-work, so he insists on 
this that his time and theirs may not seem to be wholly 
wasted- The great difficulty of teaching well, however, 
is after all but a poor excuse for contentedly teaching 
badly, and it would be a great step in advance if teach- 
ers in general were as dissatisfied with themselves as they 
usually are with their pupils.* 

Mr. Spencer on Moral and Physical Education. I do 
not purpose following Mr. Spencer through his chapters 
on moral and physical education. In practice I find I 
can draw no line between moral and religious education; 
so the discussion of one without the other has not for 

* Mr. Spencer and Professor Tyndall appeal to the results of 
experience as justifying a more rational method of teaching. 
Speaking of geometrical deductions, Mr. Spencer says : "It has 
repeatedly occurred that those who have been stupefied by the 
ordinary school-drill — by its abstract formulas, its wearisome 
tasks, its cramming — have suddenly had their intellects roused by 
thus ceasing to make them passive recipients, and inducing them 
to become active discoverers. The discouragement caused by 
bad teaching having been diminished by a little sympathy, and 
suflBcient perseverance excited to achieve a first success, there 
arises a revolution of feeling affecting the whole nature. They 
no longer find themselves incompetent; they too can do some- 
thing. And gradually, as success follows success, the incubus 
of despair disappears, and they attack the difficulties of their 
other studies with a courage insuring conquest." 



268 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

me mucli interest. Mr. Spencer has some very valuable 
remarks on physical education which I could do little 
more than extract, and I have already made too many 
quotations from a work which will be in the hands of 
most of my readers. 

Mr. Spencer differs very widely from the great body 
of our schoolmasters. I have ventured in turn to differ 
on some points from Mr. Spencer; but I am none the 
less conscious that he has written not only one of the 
most readable, but also one of the most important books 
on education in the English language. 



X. 



THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 

Necessity of a Working Ideal. One of the great wants 
of middle-class education at present, is an ideal to work 
toward. Our old public schools have such an ideal. 
The model public school-man is a gentleman who is 
an elegant Latin and Greek scholar. True, this may 
not be a very good ideal, and some of our ablest men, 
both literary and scientific, are profoundly dissatisfied 
with it. But, so long as it is maintained, all questions 
of reform are comparatively simple. In middle-class 
schools, on the other hand, there is no terminus ad 
qiiem. A number of boys are got together, and the 
question arises, not simply hoiu to teach, but what to 
teach. Where the masters are not university men, they 



THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 269 

are, it may be, not men of broad views or high culture. 
Of course no one will suppose me ignorant of the fact 
that a great number of teachers who have never been at 
a university, are both enlightened and highly cultivated ; 
and also that many teachers who have taken degrees, 
even in honors, are neither. But, speaking broadly of 
the two classes, I may fairly assume that the non-univer- 
sity men are inferior in these respects to the graduates. 
If not, our universities should be reformed on Carlyle's 
'Mive-coal^' principle, without further loss of time. 
Many non-university masters have been engaged in 
teaching ever since they were boys themselves, and 
teaching is a very narrowing occupation. They are apt 
therefore to be careless of general principles, and to 
aim merely at storing their pupils' memory ^\Wi facts — 
facts about language, about history, about geography, 
without troubling themselves to consider what is and 
what is not worth knowing, or what faculties the boys 
have, and how they should be developed. The conse- 
quence is their boys get up, for the purpose of forget- 
ting with all convenient speed, quantities of details 
about as instructive and entertaining as the Propria 
qucB mariius, such as the division of England under 
the Heptarchy, the battles in the wars of the Roses, and 
lists of geographical names. 

How University Men Cram. Where the masters are 
university men, they have rather a contempt for this kind 
of cramming, which makes them do it badly, if they 
attempt it at all : but they are driven to this teaching 
in many cases because they do not know what to substi- 
tute in its place. Their own education was in classics 



270 £SSAyS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

and mathematics. Their pupils are too young to have 
much capacity for mathematics, and they will leave 
school too soon to get any sound knowledge of classics, 
so the strength of the teaching ought clearly not to be 
thrown into these subjects. But the master really 
knows no other. He soon finds that he is not much 
his pupils' superior in acquaintance with the theory of 
the English language or with history and geography. 
There are not many men with sufficient strength of will 
to study whilst their energies are taxed by teaching, and 
standard books are not always within reach : so the 
master is forced to content himself with hearing lessons 
in a perfunctory way out of dreary school-books. Hence 
it comes to pass that he goes on teaching subjects of 
which he himself is ignorant, subjects, too, of which he 
does not recognize the importance, with an enlightened 
disbelief in his own method of tuition. He finds it up- 
hill work, to be sure — labor of Sisyphus, in fact — and is 
conscious that his pupils do not get on, however hard 
he may try to drive them ; but he never hoped for suc- 
cess in his teaching, so the want of it does not distress 
him. I may be suspected of caricature, but not, I think, 
by university men who have themselves had to teach 
anything besides classics and mathematics. 

Scliool-teacMiig CoiKmonly a Failure. If there is any 
truth in v/hat I have been saying, school-teaching, in 
subjects other than classics and mathematics (which I 
am not now considering), is very commonly a failure. 
And a failure it must remain until boys can be got to 
work with a will, in other words, to feel interest in 
the subject taught. I know there is a strong prejudice 



THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 27 1 

in some people's minds against the notion of making 
learning pleasant. They remind ns that school should 
be a preparation for after-iife. After-liie will bring 
with it an immense amount of drudgery. If, they say, 
things at school are made too easy and pleasant (words, 
by the way, very often and very erroneously confounded), 
school will cease to give the proper discipline : boys will 
be turned out not knowing what hard work is, which, 
after all, is the most important lesson that can be taught 
them. In these views I sincerely concur, so far as this, 
at least, that we want boys to work hard and vigorously 
to go through necessary drudgery, i.e., labor in itself 
disagreeable. But this result is not attained by such a 
system as I have described. Boys do not learn to work 
hard, but in a dull, stupid way, with most of their 
faculties lying dormant, and though they are put through 
a vast quantity of drudgery, they seem as incapable of 
throwing any energy into it, as prisoners on the tread- 
mill. 

Interest an Absolute K'ecessity. I think we shall find, 
on consideration, that no one succeeds in any occupation 
unless that occupation is interesting, either in itself or 
from some object that is to be obtained by means of it. 
Only when such an interest is aroused is energy possible. 
]S[o one will deny that, as a rule, the most successful 
men are those for whom their employment has the 
greatest attractions. We should be sorry to give our- 
selves up to the treatment of a doctor who thought the 
study of disease mere drudgery, or a dentist who felt a 
strong repugnance to operating on teeth. No doubt, 
the successful man in every pursuit has to go through a 



272 ESSAYS OAT EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

great deal of drudgery, but he has a general interest in 
the subject, which extends, partially at least, to its most 
wearisome details ; his energy, too, is excited by the 
desire of what the drudgery will gain for him.* 

Pleasure the Means, not the End. Observe, that 
although I would have boys take pleasure in their work, 
I regard the pleasure as a means, not an end. If it 
could be proved that the mind was best trained by the 
most repulsive exercises, I should most certainly enforce 
them. But I do not think that the mind is benefited 
by galley-slave labor : indeed, hardly any of its faculties 
are capable of such labor. We can compel a boy to 

* On this subject I can quote the authority of a great observer 
of the mind — no less a man, indeed, than "Wordsworth. He 
speaks of the " grand elementary principle of pleasure, by which 
man knows, and feels, and lives, and moves. We have no sym- 
pathy," he continues, "but what is propagated by pleasure— I 
would not be misunderstood — but wherever we sympathize with 
pain, it will be found that the sympathy is produced and carried 
on by subtle combinations with pleasure. We have no knowl- 
edge, that is, no general principles drawn from the contemplation 
of particular facts, but what has been built up by pleasure, and 
exists in us by pleasure alone. The man of science, the chemist, 
and mathematician, whatever difficulties and disgusts they may 
have to struggle with, know and feel this. However painful 
may be the objects with which the anatomist's knowledge may 
be connected, he feels that his knowledge is pleasure, and when 
Tie has no pleasure he has no knowledge." — Preface to second edition 
of Lyrical Ballads. If we accept Professor Bain's doctrine, 
"States of pleasure are connected with an increase, and states of 
pain with a diminution, of some or all of the vital functions," it 
will follow that the healthy discharge of the functions, either of 
the mind or the body, must be pleasurable. However, I merely^ 
suggest this for consideration. 



THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 2/3 

learn a thing by heart, but we can not compel him to 
wish to understand it; and the intellect does not act 
without the will. Hence, when anything is required 
which can not be performed by the memory alone, the 
driving system utterly breaks down; and even the 
memory, as I hope to show presently, works much more 
effectually in matters about which the mind feels an 
interest. Indeed, the mind without sympathy and 
interest is like the sea-anemone when the tide is down, 
an unlovely thing, closed against external influences, 
enduring existence as best it can. But let it find itself 
in a more congenial element, and it opens out at once, 
shows altogether unexpected capacities, and eagerly 
assimilates all the proper food that comes within its 
reach. Our school-teaching is often little better than 
an attempt to get sea-anemones to flourish on dry land. 

We see, then, that a boy, before he can throw energy 
into study, must find that study interesting in itself, 
or in its results. 

How Interest is Excited. Some subjects, properly 
taught, are interesting in themselves. 

Some subjects may be interesting to older and more 
thoughtful boys, from a perception of their usefulness. 

All subjects may be made interesting by emulation. 

Hardly any effort is made in some schools to interest 
the younger children in their work, and yet no effort 
can be, as the Germans say, more "rewarding." The 
teacher of children has this advantage, that his pupils 
are never dull and listless, as youths are apt to be. If 
they are not attending to him, they very soon give him 
notice of it, and if he has the sense to see that their in- 



274 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

attention is his fault, not theirs, this will save him much 
annoyance and them much misery. He'has, too, another 
advantage, which gives him the power of gaining their 
attention — their emulation is easily excited. In the 
Waisenhaus at Halle I once heard a class of very young 
children, none of them much above six years old, per- 
form feats of mental arithmetic quite beyond their age 
(I wished their teacher had not been so successful), and 
I well remember the pretty eagerness with which each 
child held out a little hand and shouted, '^ Mich!'' to 
gain the privilege of answering. 

The Child's Area of Interest. Then again, there are 
many subjects in which children take an interest. In- 
deed, all visible things, especially animals, are much 
more to them than to us. K child has made acquain- 
tance with all the animals in the neighborhood, and can 
tell you much more about the house and its surround- 
ings than you know yourself. But all this knowledge 
and interest j^ou would wish forgotten^directly he comes 
into school. Eeading, writing, and figures are taught 
in the driest manner. The first two are in themselves 
not uninteresting to the child, as he has something to 
do, and young people are m^ucli more ready to do any- 
thing than to learn anything. But when lessons are 
given the child to learn, they are not about things con- 
cerning which he has ideas, and feels an interest, but 
you teach him the Catechism — mere sounds — and, that 
Alfred (to him only a name) came to the throne in 871, 
though he has no notion what the throne is, or what 
871 means. The child learns the lesson with much 
trouble and small profit, bearing the infliction with 



THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 2/5 

what patience he can, till he escapes out of school, and 
begins to learn much more faster on a very different 
system. 

Pestalozzian Practice at Variance with Pestalozzian 
Principle. An attempt has been made by the Pestaloz- 
zians to remedy all this. They insist strongly on the 
necessity of teaching children about tilings, and of ap- 
pealing to their senses. But, to judge from the Cheam 
manual, they have succeeded merely in proving that 
lessons on things may be made as tiresome as any other 
lessons. They hold up an object, say a piece of sponge, 
and run through all the adjectives which can possibly 
be applied to it. " This is sponge. Sponge is an 
animal product. Sponge is amorphous. Sponge is 
porous. Sponge is absorbent," etc., etc. I have no 
practical acquaintance with this method, but confess I 
do not like the look of it from a distance.'^ 

Importance of Good Pictures. We cannot often intro- 
duce into the school the thing, much less the animal, 
which children would care to see, but we can introduce 
what will please the children as well, in some cases even 
better, viz., good pictures. A teacher who could draw 
boldly on the blackboard, would have no difficulty in 
arresting the children's attention. But, of course, few 
can do this. Pictures must, therefore, be provided for 
him. A good deal has been done of late years in the 
way of illustrating children's books, and even childhood 
must be the happier for such pictures as those of Tenniel 

* Mr. Herbert Spencer has conclusively shown Pestalozzian 
practices are often at variance with Pestalozzian principles. — 
Education, chap. ii. 



276 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

and Harrison "Weir. But, it seems well understood that 
these gentlemen are incapable of doing anything for 
children beyond affording them innocent amusement, 
and we should be as much surprised at seeing their 
works introduced into that region of asceticism, the 
English school-room, as if we ran across one of EaphaePs 
Madonnas in a Baptist chapel. 

A Model Lesson in Leipzig. I had the good fortune, 
some years ago, to be present at the lessons given by a 
very excellent teacher to the youngest class, consisting 
both of boys and girls, at the first Burger-schule of 
Leipzig. In Saxony the schooling which the state de- 
mands for each child, begins at six years old, and lasts 
till fourteen. These children were, therefore, between 
six and seven. In one year, a certain Dr. Vater taught 
them to read, write, and reckon. His method was as 
follows: — Each child had a book with pictures of ob- 
jects, such as a hat, a slate, etc. Under the picture was 
the name of the object in printing and writing characters, 
and also a couplet about the object. The children hav- 
ing opened their books, and found the picture of a hat, 
the teacher showed them a hat, and told them a tale 
connected with one. He then asked the children ques- 
tions about his story, and about the hat he had in his 
hand — What was the color of it ? etc. He then drew a 
hat on the blackboard, and made the children copy it on 
their slates. Next he wrote the word ^'hat," and told 
them that for people who could read this did as well as 
the picture. The children then copied the word on 
their slates. The teacher proceeded to analyze the word 
"■ hat." " It is made up," said he, " of three sounds,. 



THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 2 7/ 

the most important of which is the a, which comes in 
the middle." In all cases the vowel sound was first 
ascertained in every syllable, and then was given an ap- 
proximation to the consonantal sounds before and after. 
The couplet was now read by the teacher, and the chil- 
dren rejoeated it after him. In this way the book had 
to be worked over and over till the children were per- 
fectly familiar with everything in it. They had been 
already six months thus employed when I visited the 
school, and knew the book pretty thoroughly. To test 
tlieir knowledge. Dr. Vater first wrote a number of cap- 
itals at random, on the board, and called out a boy to 
tell him words having these capitals as initials. This 
boy had to call out a girl to do something of the kind, 
she a boy, and so forth. Everything was done very 
smartly, both by master and children. The best proof 
I saw of their accuracy and quickness was this: the 
master traced words from the book very rapidly with a 
stick on the blackboard, and the children always called 
out the right word, though I often could not follow him. 
He also wrote witJi chalk words which the children had 
never seen, and made them name first the vowel sounds, 
then the consonantal, then combine them. 

The Merits of this Kind of Teaching. I have been thus 
minute in my description of this lesson, because it seems 
to me an admirable example of the way in which chil- 
dren between six and eight years of age should be taught. 
The method was arranged and the book prepared by the 
late Dr. Vogel, who was then Director of the school. 
Its merits, as its author pointed out to me, are : — 1. 
'That it connects the instruction with objects of which 



278 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

the child has already an idea in his mind, and so associ- 
ates new knowledge with old; 2. That it gives the chil- 
dren plenty to do as well as to learn, a point on which 
the Doctor was very emphatic; 3. That it makes the 
children go over the same matter in various ways, till 
they have learnt a little tliorouglily, and then applies 
their knowledge to the acquirement of more. Here the 
Doctor seems to have followed Jacotot. But though 
the method was no doubt a good one, I must say its suc- 
cess at Leipzig Avas due at least as much to Dr. Vater as 
to Dr. Vogel. This gentleman had been taking the 
youngest class in this school for twenty years, and, 
whether by practice or natural talent, he had acquired 
precisely the right manner for keeping children's atten- 
tion. He was energetic without bustle and excitement, 
and quiet without a suspicion of dullness or apathy. By 
frequently changing the employment of the class, and 
requiring smartness in everything that was done, he kept 
them all on the alert. The lesson I have described was 
followed without pause by one in arithmetic, the two 
together occupying an hour an three-quarters, and the 
interest of the children never flagged throughout. 

Method of Teaching Reading: Stories of Animals; 
JEsop's Fables. It is then possible to teach children, at 
this stage at least, without making them hate their work, 
and dread the sound of the school-bell. 

I will suppose a child to have passed through such a 
course as this by the time he is eight or nine years old. 
He can now read and copy easy words. What we next 
want for him is a series of good reading-books, about 
things in which he takes an interest. The language 



rilOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 279 

must of course be simple, but the matter so good that 
neither master nor pupils will be disgusted by its fre- 
quent repetition. 

The first volume may very well be about animals — 
dogs, horses, etc., of which large pictures should be pro- 
vided, illustrating the text. The first cost of these pic- 
tures would be considerable, but as they would last for 
years, the expense to the friends of each child taught 
from them, would be a mere trifle. 

The books placed in the hands of the children should 
be well printed, and strongly bound. In the present 
penny-wise system, school-books are given out in cloth, 
and the leaves are loose at the end of a fortnight, so that 
children get accustomed to their destruction, and treat 
it as a matter of course. This ruins their respect for 
books, which is not so unimportant a matter as it may at 
first appear. 

After each reading lesson, which should contain at 
least one interesting anecdote, there should be columns 
of all the words which occurred for the first time in that 
lesson. These should be arranged according to their 
grammatical classification, not that the child should be 
taught grammar, but this order is as good as any other, 
and by it the child would learn to observe certain differ- 
ences in words almost unconsciously. As good reading 
is best learnt by imitation, the lesson should first be 
read aloud by the master. It will sometimes be a use- 
ful exercise to make the children prepare a lesson be- 
forehand, and give an account of the substance of it be- 
fore opening their books. '* Accustoming boys to read 
aloud what they do not first understand, '^ says Dr. 



280 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Pranklin, '^ is the cause of those even set tones so com- 
mon iimong readers, which, when they have once got a 
habit of using, they find so difficult to correct ; by which 
means, among fifty readers we scarcely find a good 
one."* 

As a change reading-book, ^sop's Fables may now be 
used, and an edition with such illustrations as TennieFs 
will be well worth the additional outlay. 

Reading and Reciting Poetry. Easy descriptive and 
narrative poetry should be learnt by heart in this form. 
That the children may repeat it well, they should get 
their first notions of it from the master viva voce. Ac- 
cording to the usual plan, they get it up with false em- 
phasis and false stops, and the more thoroughly they 
have learnt the piece, the more difficulty the master has 
in making them say it properly. 

Every lesson should be worked over in various ways. 
The columns of words at the end of the reading lessons 
may be printed with Avriting characters, and used for cop- 
ies. To write an upright column either of words or fig- 
ures is an excellent exercise in neatness. The columns 
will also be used as spelling lessons, and the children 
may be questioned about the meaning of the words. 
The poetry, when thoroughly learned, may sometimes 
be written from memory. Sentences from the book may 
be copied either directly or from the blackboard, and af- 
terward used for dictation. 

Errors in giving Dictation Lessons. Dictation lessons 
are often given very badly. The boys spell nearly as 

* Essays. SJceich of an English School. 



THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 251 

many words wrong as right, and if even all the blunders 
are corrected, little more pains is taken to impress the 
right way on their memory than the wrong. But the 
chief use of dictation is to fix in the memory by practice 
words already known. Another mistake is for the mas- 
ter to keep repeating the piece the boys are writing. 
He should first read the sentence straight through, that 
the boys may know what they are writing about. Then 
he should read it by clauses, slowly and distinctly, wait- 
ing a sufficient time between the clauses, but never re- 
2)eating them. This exercises the boys' attention, and 
accustoms their ear to the form of good sentences — an 
excellent preparation for composition. Where the dic- 
tation lesson has been given from the reading-book, the 
boys may afterward take the book and correct either 
their own exercises or one another's.* 

Method in Composition Lessons. Boys should as soon 
as possible be accustomed to write out fables, or the sub- 
stance of other reading-lessons, in their own words. 
They may also write descriptions of things Avith which 
they are familiar, or any event which has recently hap- 
]Dened, such as a country excursion. Everyone feels the 
necessity, on grounds of practical utility at all events, 

* Mr. R. Robinson, in his Manual of Metliod and Organization, 
gives some good hints for impressing on boys' memories the 
words they have spelt wrong. An exercise-book, he says, should 
always be used for the dictation lesson, and of every word in 
which a boy blunders, he should afterward make a line at the 
end of the book, writing the word as many times as it will go in 
the line. Now and then the master may turn to these words, and 
examine the boy in them, and by comparing different books, he 
will see which words are most likely to be wrongly spelt. 



282 ESSAYS OiV EDUCATIONAL REEORMERS. 

of boys being taught to express their thoughts neatly on 
paper, in good English and with correct spelling. Yet 
this is a point rarely reached before the age of fifteen or 
sixteen, often never reached at all. The reason is, that 
written exercises must be carefully looked over by the 
master, or they are done in a slovenly manner. Any one 
who has never taught in a school will say, '^Then let the 
master carefully look them over." But the expenditure 
of time and trouble this involves on the master is sa 
great that in the end he is pretty sure either to have few 
exercises written, or to neglect to look them over. The 
only remedy is for the master not to have many boys to 
teach, and not to be many hours in school. Even then, 
unless he set apart a special time every day for correcting 
exercises, he is likely to find them '^ increase upon him." 

The course of reading-books, accompanied by large 
illustrations, may go on to many other things which the 
children see around them, such as trees and plants, and 
so lead up to instruction in natural history and physiol- 
ogy. But in imparting all knowledge of this kind, we 
should aim, not at getting the children to remember a 
number of facts, but at opening their eyes, and extend- 
ing the range of their interests. 

Bearing of the Three Reading-books. Hitherto I have 
supposed the children to have only three books at the 
same time; viz., a reading-book about animals and 
things, a poetry-book, and iEsop's Fables. With the 
first commences a series culminating in works of sci- 
ence; with the second a series that should lead up to 
Milton and Shakespeare; the third should be succeeded 
by some of our best writers in prose. 



THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 283 

An Allowable Ignorance. But many schoolmasters 
will shudder at the thought of a child^s spending a year 
or two at school without ever hearing of the Heptarchy 
or Magna Charta, and without knowing the names of 
the great towns in any country of Europe. I confess I 
regard this ignorance with great equanimity. If the 
child, or the youth even, takes no interest in the Hep- 
tarchy and Magna Charta, and knows nothing of the 
towns but their names, I think him quite as well off 
without this knowledge as with it — perhaps better, as 
such knowledge turns the lad into a "wind-bag," as 
Carlyle might say, and gives him the appearance of being 
well-informed without the reality. But I neither de- 
spise a knowledge of history and geography, nor do I 
think that these studies should be neglected for foreign 
languages or science; and it is because I should wish a 
pupil of mine to become in the end thoroughly conver- 
sant in history and geography, that I should, if possible, 
conceal from him the existence of the numerous school 
manuals on these subjects. 

The Right and the Wrong Use of Epitomes. We will 
suppose that a parent meets with a book which he thinks 
will be both instructive and entertaining to his children. 
But the book is a large one, and would take a long time 
to get through; so, instead of reading any part of it to 
them or letting them read it for themselves, he makes 
them learn the index ly heart. The children do not find 
it entertaining; they get a horror of the book, which 
prevents their ever looking at it afterward, and they 
forget the index as soon as they possibly can. Just such 
is the sagacious plan adopted in teaching history and 



284 £SSAVS ON -.EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

geography iu schools, ijnd such are the natural conse- 
quences. Every student knows that the use of an epi- 
tome is to systematize knowledge, not to communicate it, 
and yet, in teaching, we givethe epitome first, and al- 
low it to precede, or rather to si^pplant, the knowledge 
epitomized. The children are disgusted, and no won- 
der. The subjects, indeed, are interesting, but not so 
the epitomes. I suppose if we could see the skeletons 
of the Gunnings, we should not find them more fasci- 
nating than any other skeletons. 

To Excite Interest the First Thing. The first thing 
to be aimed at, then, is to excite the children's interest 
Even if we thought of nothing but the acquiring of in- 
formation, this is clearly the true method. What are 
the facts which we remember ? Those in which we feel 
an interest. If we are told that So-and-so has met with 
an accident, or failed in business, we forget it directly, 
unless we know the person spoken of. Similarly, if I 
read anything about Addison or Goldsmith, it interests 
me, and I remember it, because they are, so to speak, 
friends of mine; but the same information about Sir 
Eichard Blackmore or Cumberland would not stay in 
my head for four-and-twenty hours. So, again, we nat- 
urally retain anything we learn about a foreign country 
in which a relation has settled, but it would require 
some little trouble to commit to memory the same facts 
about a place in which we had no concern. All this 
proceeds from two causes. First, that the mind retains 
that in which it takes an interest; and, secondly, that 
one of the principal helps to memory is the association 
of ideas. 



THOUGHTS AKD SUGGESTIONS. 285 

Dr. Arnold's Child's First History Book. These were, 
no doubt, the ground reasons which influenced Dr. Ar- 
nold in framing his plan of a child's first history-book. 
This book, he says, should be a picture-book of the 
memorable deeds which would best appeal to the child's 
imagination. They should be arranged in order of time, 
but with no other connection. The letterpress should 
simply, but fully, tell the story of the action depicted. 
These would form starting-points of interest. The child 
would be curious to know more about the great men 
whose acquaintance he had made, and would associate 
with them the scenes of their exploits; and thus we 
might actually find our children anxious to learn history 
and geography ! I am sorry that even the great authority 
of Dr. Arnold has not availed to bring this method into 
use. Such a book would, of course, be dear. Bad pic- 
tures are worse than none at all: and Goethe tells us 
that his appreciation of Homer was for years destroyed 
by his having been shown, when a child, absurd pictures 
of the Homeric heroes. The book would, therefore, cost 
six or eight shillings at least; and who would give this 
sum for an account of single actions of a few great men, 
when he might buy the lives of all great men, together 
with ancient and modern history, the names of the 
planets, and a great amount of miscellaneous informa- 
tion, all for half-a-crown in " Mangn all's Questions ?" 

However, if the saving of a few shillings is more to be 
thought of than the best method of instruction, the sub- 
ject hardly deserves our serious consideration. 

Distinguished Authors Seldom Write for the Young. 
It is much to be regretted that books for the young are 



286 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 



SO seldom written by distinguished authors. I suppose 
that of the three things which the author seeks — money, 
reputation, influence — the first is not often despised, nor 
the last considered the least valuable. And yet both 
both money and influence are more certainly gained by 
a good book for the young, than by any other. The in- 
fluence of ^' Tom Brown, ""^ however different in kind, is 
probably not smaller in amount than of ^^ Sartor Resar- 
tus.^' 

An improvement, I hope, has already begun. Miss 
Yonge's '^ Golden Deeds " is just the sort of book that 
I have been recommending. Professor Huxley has 
lately published an elementary book on Physiology, and 
Professor Kingsley has promised us a '^'' Boys' History 
of England." 

Needed, a Macaulay for Boys. What we want is a 
Macaulay for boys, who shall handle historical subjects 
with that wonderful art displayed in the '^ Essays " — 
the art of elaborating all the more telling portions of 
the subject, outlining the rest, and suppressing every- 
thing that does not conduce to heighten the general 
effect. Some of these essays, such as the "Hastings'^ 
and "Olive," will be read with avidity by the elder 
boys; but as Macaulay did not write for children, he 
abounds in words to them unintelligible. Had he been 
a married man, we might perhaps have had such a vol- 
ume of historical sketches for boys as now we must wish 
for in vain. But there are good story-tellers left among 
us, and we might soon expect such books as we desider- 
ate, if it were clearly understood what is the right sort 
of book, and if men of literary ability and experience 



THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 28/ 

would condescend to write them. At present, teachers 
who have a " connection " make compendiums, which 
last only as long as the " connection ^' that floats them : 
and literary men, if they wish to make money out of 
the young, hand over works written for adults, to some 
underling, who epitomizes them for schools. Of Mr. 
Knight, who has done so much for sound education, I 
should have expected better things; but he tells us in a 
volume of some 500 pages, called " Knight's School His- 
tory of England," condensed from his large history under 
Ms superintendence, that he trusts no event of import- 
ance in our annals has been omitted. This seems to me 
like trusting that the work is valueless for all purposes 
of rational instruction. 

How History for Children should be Written. If in 
these latter days ^'^the individual withers, and the world 
is more and more," we must not expect our children to 
enter into this. Their sympathy and their imagination 
can be aroused, not for nations, but for individuals ; 
and this is the reason why some biographies of great men 
should precede any history. These should be written 
after Macaulay's method. There should be no attempt 
at completeness, but what is most important and inter- 
esting about the man should be narrated in detail, and 
the rest lightly sketched, or omitted altogether. Paint- 
ers understand this principle, and in taking a portrait, 
very often depict a man's features minutely without 
telling all the truth about the buttons on his waistcoat. 
But, because in a literary picture each touch takes up 
additional space, writers seem to fear that the pictare 
will be distorted unless every particular is expanded or 



288 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

condensed in the same ratio. As a model for our biog- 
raphies, we may take ^^ Plutarch's Lives/'' which should 
be read as soon as boys are old enough to like them.* 

Biography for Children. At the risk of wearisome 
repetition, I must again say, that I care as little about 
driving "useful knowledge'^ into a boy, as the m.ost 
ultra Cambridge-man could wish; but I want to get the 
boy to have wide sympathies, and to teach himself; and 
I should therefore select the great men from very differ- 
ent periods and countries, that his net of interest (if I 
am allowed the metaphor) may be spread in all waters. 

Importance of Maps and Books of Travel. When we 
have thus got our boys to form the acquaintance of 
great men, they will have certain associations connected, 
with many towns and countries. Constant reference 
should be made to the map, and the boys' knowledge 
and interest will thus make settlements in different parts 
of the globe. These may be extended by a good book 
of travels, especially of voyages of discovery. There are, 

* " There is no profane study better than Plutarch: all other 
learning is private, fitter for universities than cities; fuller of 
contemplation than experience; more commendable in students 
themselves than profitable unto others. Whereas stories are fit 
for every place, reach to all persons, serve for all times: teach 
the living, revive the dead; so far excelling all other books, as it 
is better to see learning in noble men's lives than to read it in 
philosopher's writings. Nor for the author . . . I believe I might 
be bold to alfirm that he hath written the profitablest story of all 
authors; . . . being excellent in wit, learning, and experience, he 
hath chosen the special acts of the best persons of the famousest 
nations of the world." — Sir Thomas North's Dedication to Queen 
Elizabeth of his translation of Pluiarcli. 



THOUGHTS AND SUGGESTIONS. 289 



no doubt, riitany such books suitable for the purpose, but 
the only one I have met with is Miss Hack's "Winter 
Evenings; or. Tales of Travelers," which has been a 
great favorite with children for the last five-and-twenty 
years at least. This is a capital book, but the very child- 
ish conversations interpolated in the narratives would 
disgust a boy a little too old for them, much more than 
they would an adult reader. In studying such travels, 
the map should, of course, be always in sight; and out- 
line maps may be filled up by the boys, as they learn 
about the places in the traveler's route. Any one who 
has had the management of a school library knows how 
popular *' voyage and venture^' is with the boys who 
have passed the stage in which the picture-books of 
animals were the main attraction. Captain Cook, Mungo 
Park, and Admiral Byron are heroes without whom boy- 
hood would be incomplete; but as boys are engrossed by 
the adventures, and never trouble themselves about the 
map, they often remember the incidents without know- 
ing where they happened. 

Of course school geographies never mention such 
people as celebrated travelers : if they did, it would be 
impossible to give all the principal geographical names 
in the world within the compass of two hundred pages. 

Outcome of such a Course. What might we fairly ex- 
pect from such a course of teaching as I have here sug- 
gested ? 

At the end of a year and a half or two years from the 
age, say, of nine, the boy would read aloud well; he 
would write fairly, he would spell all common English 
words correctly ; he would have had bis interest excited 



290 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

or increased in common objects, such as animals, trees, 
and plants; he would have made the acquaintance of some 
great men, and traced the voyages of some great trav- 
elers; he would be able to say by heart some of the best 
simple English poetry, and his ear would be familiar 
with the sound of good English prose. Above all, he 
would not have learned to look upon books and school- 
time as the torment of his life, nor have fallen into the 
habit of giving them as little of his attention as he could 
reconcile with immunity from the cane. The benefit of 
this negative result, at all events, might prove incalcu- 
lable. 



XL 

MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 

Occupies a Larger Space in Theory than Practice. All 

who are acquainted with the standard treatises on the 
theory of education, and also with the management of 
schools, will have observed that moral and religious 
training occupies a larger and more prominent space in 
theory than in practice. On consideration, we shall find 
perhaps that this might naturally be expected. Of 
course we are all agreed that morality is more important 
than learning, and masters who are many of them clergy- 
men, will hardly be accused of underestimating the value 
iA religion. Why, then, does not moral and religious 
training receive a larger share of the master^s attention? 



MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 29 1 

The reason I take to be this. Experience shows that it 
depends directly on the master whether a boy acquires 
knowledge, but only indirectly, and in a much less 
degree, whether he grows up a good and religious man. 
The aim which engrosses most of our time is likely to 
absorb an equal share of our interest ; and thus it 
happens that masters, especially those who never asso- 
ciate on terms of intimacy with their pupils out of 
school, throw energy enough into making boys learns 
but seldom think at all of the development of their 
character, or about their thoughts and feelings in mat- 
ters of religion. This statement may indeed be exag- 
gerated, but no one who has the means of judging will 
assert that it is altogether without foundation. 

Influence of the Master. And yet, although a master 
<5an be more certain of sending out his pupils well taught 
than well principled, his influence on their character is 
much greater than it might appear to a superficial 
observer. I intend speaking presently of formal religious 
instruction. I refer now to the teacher^s indirect influ- 
ence. The results of his formal teaching vary as its 
amount, but he can apply no such gauge to his informal 
teaching. A few words of earnest advice or remon- 
strance, which a boy hears at the right time from a man 
whom he respects, may afPect that boy's character for 
life. Here everything depends, not on the words used, 
but on the feeling with which they are spoken, and on 
the way in which the speaker is regarded by the hearer. 
In such matters the master has a much more delicate 
and difficult task than in mere instruction. The words, 
indeed, are soon spoken, but that which gives them their 



292 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

influence is not soon or easily acquired. Here, as in so* 
many otlier instances, we may in a few minutes throw 
down what it has cost us days — perhaps years — to build 
up. An unkind word will destroy the effects of long- 
continued kindness. Boys always form their opinion of 
a man from the worst they know of him. Experience 
has not yet taught them that good people have their 
failings, and bad people their virtues. If the scholars 
find the master at times harsh and testy, they can not 
believe in his kindness of heart and care for their welfare. 
They do not see that he may have an ideal before hinii 
to which he is partly, though not wholly, true. They 
judge him by his demeanor in his least guarded moments 
— at times when he is jaded and dissatisfied with the re- 
sults of his labors. At such times the bonds of sympathy 
between him and his pupils hang loose. He is conscious 
only of his power and of his mental superiority. Feeling 
almost a contempt for the boys' weakness, he does not 
care for their opinion of him, or think for an instant 
what impression he is making by his words and conduct. 
He gives full play to his arUtrium, and says or does 
something which seems to the boys to reveal him in his 
true character, and which causes them ever after to dis- 
trust his kindness. 

Two Kinds of Teachers. When we consider the way 
in which masters endeavor to gain influence, we shall 
find that they may be divided roughly into two parties, 
whom I will call, as a matter of convenience, realists and 
idealists. A teacher of the real party endeavors to 
appear to his pupils precisely as he is. He will hear of 
no restraint except that of decorum. He believes that. 



MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 293 

if he is as much the superior of his pupils as he ought to 
%Qf his authority will take care of itself, without his cast- 
ing round it a wall of artificial reserve. "Be natural,^' 
he says ; " get rid of affectations and shams of all kinds ; 
and then, if there is any good in you, it will tell on those 
around you. AVhatever is bad would be felt just as 
surely in disguise ; and the disguise would only be an 
additional source of mischief." The idealists, on the 
other hand, wish their pupils to think of them as they 
ought to be, rather than as they are. They urge against 
the realists that our words and actions can not always be 
in harmony with our thoughts and feelings, however 
much we may desire to make them so. We must, there- 
fore, they say, reconcile ourselves to this fact ; and since 
our words and actions are more under our control than 
our thoughts and feelings, we must make them as nearly 
as possible what they should be, instead of debasing them 
to involuntary thoughts and feelings which are not 
worthy of us. Then, again, the idealist teacher may 
say, " The young require some one to look up to. In 
my better moments I am not altogether unworthy of 
their respect, but if they knew all my weaknesses, they 
would naturally, and perhaps justly, despise me. For 
their sakes, therefore, I must keep my weaknesses out of 
sight, and the effort to do this demands a certain reserve 
in all our intercourse." 

Danger of Excess in Either Direction. I suppose an 
excess of either realism or idealism might lead to mis- 
chievous results. The " real " man might be wanting 
in self-restraint, and might say and do things which, 
though not wrong in themselves, might have a bad effect 



^94 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

on the young. Then, again, the lower and more worldly 
side of his character might show itself in too strong re- 
lief, and his pupils seeing this mainly, aud supposing 
that they understood him entirely, might disbelieve in 
his higher motives and religious feeling. On the other 
hand, the idealists are, as it were, walking on stilts. 
They gain no real influeuce by their separation from 
their pupils, and they are always liable to an accident 
which may expose them to their ridicule. 

The True Position for the Teacher. I am, therefore, 
though with some limitation, in favor of the natural 
school. I am well aware, however, what an immense 
demand this system makes on the master who desires to 
exercise a good influence on the moral and religious 
character of his pupils. If he would have his pupils 
know him as he is, if he would have them think as he 
thinks, feel as he feels, and believe as he believes, he 
must be, at least in heart and aim, worthy of their imi- 
tation. He must (with reverence be it spoken) enter,, 
in his humble way, into the spirit of the perfect Teacher,. 
who said, '^For their sakes I sanctify myself, that 
they also may be sanctified in truth.'' Are we prepared 
to look upon our calling in this light ? 

Narrowing Influence of the Teaching Profession. I be- 
lieve that the schoolteachers of this country need not 
fear comparison with any other body of men, in point 
of morality and religious earnestness ; but I dare say 
many have found, as I have, that the occupation is a 
very narroimng one, that the teacher soon gets to work 
in a groove^ and from having his thoughts so much oc- 
cupied with routine work, especially with small fault 



MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 29$ 

findings and small corrections, he is apt to settle down 
insensibly into a kind of moral and intellectual stagna- 
tion — Philistinism, as Mr. Matthew Arnold would call 
it — in which he cares as little for high aims and general 
principles as his most commonplace pupil. Thus it 
happens sometimes that a man who set out with the 
notion of developing all the powers of his pupils' minds, 
thinks in the end of nothing but getting them to work 
out equations and do Latin exercises without false con- 
cords ; and the clergyman even who began with a strong 
sense of his responsibility, and a confident hope of influ- 
encing the boys^ belief and character at length is quite 
content if they conform to discipline, and give him no 
trouble out of school-hours. We may say of a really 
good teacher what Wordsworth says of the poet ; in his 
work he must neither 

lack that first great gift, the vital soul. 
Nor general truths, which are themselves a sort 
Of elements and agents, under-powers, 
Subordinate helpers of the living mind. — Pi'elude, i. 9. 

But the ''vital souP' is too often crushed by excessive 
routine labor, and then when general truths, both moral 
and intellectual, have ceased to interest us, our own edu- 
cation stops, and we become incapable of fulfilling the 
highest and most important part of our duty in educat- 
ing others. 

Duty to Resist Deadening Influences. It is, then, the 
duty of the teacher to resist gravitating into this state, 
no less for his pupils' sake than for his own. The ways 
and means of doing this I am by no means competent 
to point out ; so I will merely insist on the importance 



296 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 



of teachers not being overworked — a matter which ha^ 
not, I think, hitherto received due attention. 

Importance of Maintaining Good Spirits. We can 
not expect intellectual activity of men whose minds are 
compelled "with packhorse constancy to keep the 
road "' hour after hour, till they are too jaded for exer- 
tion of any kind. The man himself suffers, and his 
work, even his easiest work, suffers also. It may be 
laid down as a general rule, that no one can teach long 
and teach well. All satisfactory teaching and manage- 
ment of boys absolutely require that the master should 
be in good sinrits. When the "genial spirits fail,'' as 
they must from an overdose of monotonous work, every- 
thing goes wrong directly. The master has no longer 
the power of keeping the boys' attention, and has to re- 
sort to punishments even to preserve order. His gloom 
quenches their interest and mental activity, just as fire 
goes out before carbonic acid ; and in the end teacher 
and taught acquire, not without cause^ a feeling of mu- 
tual aversion. 

Teaching by Making the Pupils his Companions. And 
another reason why the master should not spend the 
greater part of his time in formal teaching is this — his" 
doing so compels him to neglect the informal but very 
important teaching he may both give and receive by 
making his pupils his companions. 

I fear I shall be met here by an objection which has 
only too much force in it. Most Englishmen are at a 
loss how to make any use of leisure. If a man has no 
turn for thinking, no fondness for reading, and is with- 
out a hobby, what good shall his leisure do him ? He 



MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 297 



will only pass it in insipid gossip, from which any easy 
work would be a relief. That tliis is so, in many cases, 
is a proof, to my mind, of the utter failure of our ordi- 
nary education ; and perhaps an improved education 
may some day alter what now seems a national peculi- 
m-ity. Meantime the mind, even of Englishmen, is 
more than a ^^succedaneum for salt," * and its tendency 
to bury its sight ostrich-fashion, under a heap of routine 
work, must be strenuously resisted, if it is to escape its 
deadly enemies, stupidity and ignorance. 

Moral Atmosphere of Large Schools. I have elsewhere 
expressed what I believe is the common conviction of 
those who have seen something both of large schools and 
of small, viz., that the moral atmosphere of the former 
is, as a rule, by far the more wholesome ; f and also that 
-each boy is more influenced by his companions than by 
his master. More than this, I believe that in many, 

* " That you are wife 
To so much bloated flesh as scarce Jiath soul 
Instead of salt, to keep it sweet, I think 
"Will ask DO witnesses to prove." 

Ben Jonson : 2he Demi is an Ass, Act i., bc. 3. 
f Mr. Hope, in his amusing ' ' Book about Dominies, " says, that a 
school of from twenty to a hundred boys is too large to be alto- 
gether under the influence of one man, and too small for the de- 
velopment of a healthy condition of public opinion among the 
boys themselves. "In a community of fifty boys, there will 
always be found so many bad ones who will be likely to carry 
things their own way. Vice is more unblushing in small socie- 
ties than in large ones. Fifty hoys will he more easily leavened hy 
the wickedness of jive, than -five hundred hy that of fifty. It would 
be too dangerous an ordeal to send a boy to a school where sin 
g.ppears fashionable, and where, if he would remain virtuous, he 



298 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

perhaps in most, schools, one or two boys affect the tone 
of the whole body more than any master.* 

Influence of the Elder Boys. What are called Prepar- 
atory Schools labor nnder this immense disadvantage, 
that their ruling spirits are mere children without reflec- 
tion or sense of responsibility. But where the leading 
boys are virtually young men, these may be made a 
medium through which the mind of the master may 
act upon the whole school. They can enter into the 
thoughts, feelings, and aims of the master on the one 
hand, and they know what is said and done among the 
boys on the other. The master must, therefore, know 
the elder boys intimately, and they must know him. 
This consummation, hov/ever, will not be arrived at 
without great tact and self-denial on the part of the 
master. The youth, who is '^neither man nor boy," is 
apt to be shy and awkward, and is not by any means so 



must shun his companions. There may be middle-sized schools 
which derive a good and healthy tone from the moral strength of 
their masters, or the good example of a certain set of boys, but 
I doubt if there are many. Boys are so easily led to do right or 
wrong, that we should be very careful at least to set the balance 
fairly " (p. 167) ; and again he says (p. 170), " The moral tone of 
a middle-sized school will be peculiarly liable to be at the mercy 
of a set of bold and bad boys." 

* " The moral tone of the school is made what it is, not nearly 
so much by its rules and regulations or its masters, as by the 
leading characters among the boys. They mainly determine the 
public opinion amongst their schoolfellows — their personal influ- 
ence is incalculable. " I quote these words of a master whose 
opinion is respected by all who know him, because I have been 
thought to express myself too strongly on this point. 



MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 299 

easy to entertain as the lad who chatters freely of the 
schoors cricket or foot-ball, past, present, and to come. 
But the master who feels how all-important is the tone 
of the school, will not griulge any pains to influence 
those on whom it chiefly depends. 

Shall there be Formal Religious Instruction? But, al- 
lowing the value of all these indirect influences, can we 
afford to neglect direct formal religious instruction ? 
We have most of us the greatest horror of what we call a 
secular education, meaning thereby an education with- 
out formal religious teaching. But this horror seems to 
affect our theory more than our practice. Few parents 
ever inquire what religious instruction their sons get at 
Eton, Harrow, or Westminster. I am told that, in 
amount at least, it is quite insignificant; and I can my- 
self vouch for the fact, that once upon a time the lower 
forms at one of these had no religious instruction except 
a weekly lesson in Watts' ^^ Scripture History." Even 
in some national schools, where the managers would 
rather close their doors altogether than accept the 
'^ Conscience-clause," the religious instruction is con- 
fined to teaching the Catechism by heart, and using the 
Bible as a reading-book. 

The Teaching of Religion in Germany. In this matter 
we differ very widely from the Germans. All their 
classes have a "religion-lesson" nearly every day, the 
younger children in the German Bible, the elder in the 
Greek Testament or Church History; and in all cases 
the teacher is careful to instruct his pupils in the ten- 
ets of Luther or Calvin. The Germans may urge that 
if we believe a set of doctrines to be a fitting expression 



300 ASSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

of Divine revelation, it is our first duty to make the 
young familiar with those doctrines. I can not say, 
however, that I have been favorably impressed by the 
religion-lessons I havejheard given in German schools. I 
do not deny that dogmatic teaching is necessary, but the 
first thing to cultivate in the young is reverence; and 
reverence is surely in danger if you take a class in " re- 
ligion" just as you take a class in grammar. Emerson 
says somewhere, that to the poet, the saint, and the 
philosopher, all distinction of sacred and profane ceases 
to exist, all things become alike sacred. As the school- 
boy, however, does not as yet come under any one of 
these denominations, if the distinction ceases to exist 
for him, all things will become alike profane. 

Keligious Instruction through Worship. I believe that 
religious instruction is conveyed in the most impressive 
way when it is connected with worship. Where the 
prayers are joined with the reading of Scripture, and 
with occasional simple addresses, and where the congre- 
gation have responses to repeat, and psalms and hymns 
to sing, there is reason to hope that boys will increase, 
not only in knowledge, but in wisdom and reverence 
too. Without asserting that the Church of England 
service is the best possible for the young, I hold that 
any form for them should at least resemble it in its 
main features, should be as varied as possible, should 
require frequent change of posture, and should give the 
congregation much to say and sing. The Church of 
Borne is wise, I think, in making more use than we do 
of litanies. The service, whatever its form, should be 
conducted with great solemnity, and the boys should 



MORAL AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION. 301 

not sit or kneel so close together that the badly disposed 
may disturb their neighbors who try to join in the act 
of worship. If good hymns are sung, these may be 
taken occasionally as the subject of an address, so that 
attention may be drawn to their meaning. Music 
should be carefully attended to, and the danger of irrev- 
erence at practices guarded against by never using sacred 
words more than is necessary, and by impressing on the 
singers the sacredness of everything connected with 
Divine worship. Questions combined with instruction 
may sometimes keep up boys' attention better than a 
formal sermon. Though common prayer should be fre- 
quent, this should not be supposed to take the place of 
private prayer. In many schools boys have hardly an 
opportunity for private prayer. They kneel down, per- 
haps, with all the talk and play of their schoolfellows 
going on around them, and sometimes fear of public 
opinion prevents their kneeling down at all. A school- 
master can not teach private prayer, but he can at least 
see that there is opportunity for it. 

These observations of mine only touch the surface of 
this most important subject, and do not point the way 
to any efficient religious ^education. In fact, I believe 
that education to piety, as far as it lies in human hands, 
must consist almost entirely in the influence of the 
pious superior over his inferiors.* 

* " What is education? It is that which is imbibed from the 
moral atmosphere which a child breathes. It is the involuntary 
and unconscious language of its parents and of all those by 
whom it is surrounded, and not their set speeches and set lec- 
tures. It is the words which the young hear fall from their sen- 



302 £SSAVS ON- EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

Education of Young People to Right Opinion. In con- 
clusion, I wish to say a word on the education of opin- 
ion. Helps lays great stress on preparing the way to 
moderation and open-mindedness, by teaching boys that 
all good men are not of the same way of thinking. It 
is indeed a miserable error to lead a young person to 
suppose that his small ideas are a measure of the uni- 
verse, and that all who do not accept his formularies are 
less enlightened than himself. If a young man is so 
brought up, he either carries intellectual blinkers all 
his life, or, what is far more probable, he finds that 
something he has been taught is false, and forthwith 
begins to doubt everything. On the other hand, it is a 
necessity with the young to believe, and we could not, 
even if we would, bring a youth into such a state of 
mind as to regard everything about which there is any 
variety of opinion as an open question. But he may be 
taught reverence and humility; he may be taught to re- 
flect how infinitely greater the facts of the universe must 
be than our poor thoughts about them, and how inade- 
quate are words to express even our imperfect thoughts. 
Then he will not suppose that all truth has been taught 
him in his formularies, nor that he understands even all 
the truth of which those formularies are the imperfect 
expression. * 

iors when the speakers are off their guard: and it is by these un- 
conscious expressions that the child interprets the hearts of its 
parents. That is education." — Drummond's Speeches in Parlia- 
ment. 

* In what I have said on this subject, the incompleteness which 
is noticeable enough in the preceding essays, has found an ap- 



FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN. 303 

XII. 

FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN.* 

Froebel's Study of Nature. A German word, meaning 
^' garden of children/' is the name given by Friedrich 
Froebel to a kind of ^^ play-school " invented by him for 
furthering the physical, moral, and intellectual growth 
of children between the ages of three and seven. Froe- 
beFs observation of the development of organisms and 
his fondness for analogies drawn from trees and plants 
made him attach especial importance to our earliest 
years, years in which, as he said, lies the tap-root of 
much of the thought and feeling of after-life. 

The Imparting and the Developing Theory. Although 
the analogies of nature had constantly been referred to 

propriate climax. I see too that, if any one would take the 
trouble, the little I have said might easily be misinterpreted. I 
am well aware, however, that if the young mind will not readily 
assimilate sharply defining religious formulae, still less will it 
feel at home among the '* immensities " and " veracities." The 
great educating force of Christianity I believe to be due to this, 
that it is not a set of abstractions or vague generalities, but that 
in it God reveals Himself to us in a Divine Man, and raises us 
through our devotion to Him. I hold therefore that religious 
teaching for the young should neither be vague nor abstract. 
Mr. Froude, in commenting on the use made of hagiology i» 
the Church of Rome, has shownjthat we lose much by not fol- 
lowing the Bible method of instruction. (See Short Btudies^' 
Idves of the Saints and Bepresentative Men.) 

* This chapter has been revised and enlarged by the editor. 



304 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

before Froebel's days (especially by the Greatest of 
Teachers, e.g. , " First the blade, then the ear, then the 
full corn in the ear"), and Bacon, speaking of education^ 
had said that the gardener bestows most care on the 
young plants, the Eenascence left the imparting theory 
of education so firmly fixed on the mind of Europe that 
for two hundred years the developing theory could hard- 
ly get a hearing, and little was done to reduce it to 
practice before the attempt of Pestalozzi. Pestalozzi 
and other great thinkers (notably Comenius, who at- 
tached much importance to the first years of life) looked 
to the mother as the sole educator. But in case of the 
poor the mother might not have time to attend to her 
children ; so towards the end of the last century Pesta- 
lozzi planned and Oberlin formed day-asylums for young 
children, the benefit of which was intended no less for 
the mother than the child. Schools of this kind took in 
the Netherlands the name of '^ play school," and in 
England, where they have especially thriven, of " infant 
schools." 

Kindergarten — How Different from Infant Schools. 
But Froebel's idea of the '■'■ Kindergarten" differed es- 
sentially from that of the infant schools. He maintained 
that there was something to do for young children which 
even the ideal mother in the ideal family could not do. 
The child required to be prepared for society by being 
early associated with its equals ; and young children 
thus brought together might have their employments, 
especially their chief employments, play, so organized 
for them as to draw out their capacities of feeling and 
thinking, and even of inventing and creating. 



FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN. 305 

Education to be Based on Study of Nature to be De- 
veloped. According to the development theory, all edu- 
cation must be based on study of the nature to be devel- 
oped. Froebel's study of the nature of children showed 
him that their great characteristic was restlessness. 
This was, first, restlessness of body, delight in mere mo- 
tion of the limbs ; and, secondly, restlessness of mind, 
a constant curiosity about whatever came within the 
range of the senses, and especially a desire to examine 
with the hand every unknown object within reach. 
Children's fondness for using their hands was specially 
noted by Froebel, and he found that they delighted,, 
not merely in examining by touch, but also in altering 
whatever they could alter, and further that they endeav- 
ored to imitate known forms, whether by drawing or by 
modeling in putty or clay. Besides remarking in them 
these various activities, he saw that children were so- 
ciable and needed the sympathy of companions. There 
was, too, in them a growing moral nature, passions, 
affections, and conscience, which needed to be controlled, 
responded to, cultivated. Both the restraints and the 
opportunities incident to a well-organized community 
would be beneficial to their moral nature, and prove a 
cure for selfishness. 

True Education but Spontaneous Action Rightly De- 
veloped. Froebel held that the essence of all education 
was to be found in rightly directed but spontaneous ac- 
tion. So the children must be employed ; and at that 
age their most natural employment is play, especially, as 
"Wordsworth has pointed out, games in which they im- 
itate and '* con the parts " they themselves will have to 



306 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

fill in after years. Proebel agreed with Montaigne that 
the games of children were " their most serious occupa- 
tions/^ and with Locke that " all the plays and diver- 
sions of children should be directed towards good and 
useful habits, or else they will introduce ill ones." 
(Tliouglits concerning Education, § 130.) 

The Kindergarten " Occupations." So he invented a 
course of occupations, most of which are social games. 
Many of the games are connected with the '' gifts/' as 
he called the series of simple playthings provided for the 
children, the first being the ball, " the type of unity." 
The ^^ gifts " are chiefly not mere playthings, but ma- 
terials which the children work up in their own way, 
thus gaining scope for their power of doing and invent- 
ing and creating. The artistic faculty was much thought 
of by Froebel, and, as in the education of the ancients, 
the sense of rhythm in sound and motion was cultivated 
by music and poetry introduced in the games. Much 
care was to be given to the training of the senses, es- 
pecially those of sight, sound, and touch. 

Intuition the True Basis of Knowledge. Intuition, or 
first-hand experience {Anschauung), was to be recog- 
nized as the true basis of knowledge, and though stories 
were to be told, and there was to be much intercourse in 
the way of social chat, instruction of the imparting and 
*^ learning up " kind was to be excluded. Froebel sought 
to teach the children not what to think but how to think, 
in this following in the steps of Pestalozzi, who had 
done for the child what Bacon nearly two hundred years 
before had done for the philosopher. Where possible 



FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN. 307 

the children were to be much in the open air, and were 
each to cultivate a little garden. 

Spread of the Kindergarten. To judge by all appear- 
ances at the present date (1881), the Kindergarten will 
be an important institution in the education of the fu- 
ture. The first Kindergarten was opened at Blanken- 
burg, near Eudolstadt, in 1840, but after a needy exist- 
ence of eight years was closed for want of funds. In 
1851 the Prussian Government [declared that ^'schools 
founded on Froebel's principles, or principles like them, 
could not be allowed. ^^ But the idea had far too much 
vitality to be starved or frowned down. Although its 
progress has not been rapid, it has been constant. As 
early as 1854 it was introduced into England by the then 
famous Ronges, and Henry Barnard reported on it that 
it Vv^as ^'by far the most original, attractive, aud philo- 
sophical form of infant development the world has yet 
seen '^ {Report to Governor of Connecticut, 1854). But 
the attempt failed, and though there are now a Froebel 
Society, several institutions for training young women to 
conduct Kindergartens, and also some good Kindergar- 
tens, Froebers idea is only just finding a home in Brit- 
ain. 

Kindergarten in France. — The great propagandist of 
Froebelism, the Baroness Marenholtz-Biilow, drew the 
attention of the French to the Kindergarten from the 
year 1855, and Michelet declared that Froebel had 
"^^ solved the problem of human education." In the de- 
partment of the Seine the " Salles d^asile" now consist 
of a class for children from two to four years old, and a 
'' Froebel class" of children from four to six. In Italy 



3o8 ESSA-vs ON- educati6nal reformers. 

the Kindergarten has been introduced by Madame Salis- 
Schwabe, and is used in the education of the poor. In 
Austria it is recognized and regulated by the Govern- 
ment, though the Volks-Kindergarten are not numer- 
ous. 

Kindergarten in the United States. But by far the 
greatest developments of the Kindergarten system are in 
the United States and in Belgium. Dr. William T. 
Harris, assisted by Miss Blow, tried the experiment of 
making the Kindergarten a part of the public education 
in St. Louis eight years ago (1873), and there are now 
no less than 8,000 children, alljover five years of age, in 
the St. Louis public Kindergartens. 

Kindergarten in Belgium. In Belgium the mistresses 
of the " Ecoles gardiennes " have for some time been in- 
structed in the ^'^ idea of the Kindergarten " and '^ Froe- 
bel's method," and in 1880 the Minister of Public In- 
struction, Van Humbeeck, issued a programme for the 
'' Ecoles Gardiennes Oommunales," which is both in fact 
and in profession a Kindergarten manual. This pro- 
gramme attributes the improvement in infant schools to 
'^ le souffle puissant de Froebel ;" and, after explaining 
that the method to be adopted is based on the laws which 
govern the development of the child, the Minister con- 
tinues : "In its great principles as well as in its main 
applications this method is that created by the genius of 
Froebel." This estimate of Froebel's principles contrast 
strangely with the Prussian Minister's thirty years 
earlier.* 

* Literaure. — Henry Baruard's volume, Kindergarten and Child 
Culture, Hartford, U. S. A., 1881 (Eug. agent, Thos. Lauriei 



FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEN. 309 

Froebel's Place in the History of Education.* Froe- 
bel is the legitimate successor of Kousseau and Pesta- 

31, Paternoster Row), contains a large collection of papers on the 
subject, original and translated. W. T. Harris' Beports give full 
accounts of the adaptation of the Kindergarten to public educa- 
tion at St. Louis. Kindergartens in Germany are described in 
Joseph Payne's Visit to Oerman Schools, 1876. Practical guides 
published in England are E. Wiebe's Paradise of Children, and 
Miss Lyschinkas's Pi'inciples of the Kindergarten (Isbister), 1880. 
The Autobiography of Froebel has been translated by E. Michaelis 
and H. K. Moore; also the Mutter-u. Koselieder, by Miss Lord 
(Rice, 86, Fleet Street). Some of the short papers published, as, 
e.g., Miss E. A. Manning's Froebel and Infant Training (Stanford, 
price 6tZ.), have a value quite out of proportion to their size and 
price. Miss Gurney has abridged Kohler in English as First 
Gifts, etc. (Myers), and Goldammer's Praxis has been translated 
by Wright. Miss Shirreff has lately published The Kinderganrten 
at Home (Hughes). Froebel literature in German has lately in- 
creased far beyond my knowledge, even of titles. I have had the 
following recommended to me: — Zur Frauenfrage and GrundziXge 
d. Ideen F. Froebels, by Henrietta Brejinann (Braunschweig), 
and Frauenantheil an der Volksbildung , by Amalie Sohr (Perthes, 
1883). L. Walter has attempted a complete list of books and 
periodicals on the subject in his Die Frobelliteratur . For Amer- 
ican books see Steiger's Cyclopcedia of Education; and for English, 
the list published in Report and Calender of the Froebel Society for 
1885 (Rice). 

* In the preparation of the following paragraphs upon Froebel 
v/hich are additional and supplementary to the very brief notice 
by Mr. Quick, the following works have been consulted: Joseph 
Payne's Lectures on Science and Art of Education; the Lecture on 
Froebel; see E. L. Kellogg's edition, pages 307 to 336, Payne's 
(W. H.) Compayre's History of Pedagogy; also Browning's Educa- 
iional Theories; see the publisher's, edition in the " Reading Circle 
Library " series. 



3IO ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REFORMERS. 

lozzi, although he aims wholly at infant education^ 
while his two predecessors just named occupy a much 
wider field. According to Browning, Kousseau " stands 
astride across the whole field of education. Nothing 
comes after him which is not affected by him.^' "^ With 
Proebel," says Oompayre, " we enter completely into the 
nineteenth century; he continues the work of Pesta- 
lozzi." 

Froebel and Pestalozzi. Eroebel began to teach in 
1805 at Frankfort, and soon after fell in with some of 
the writings of Pestalozzi and was greatly impressed. 
With three of his teachers, he spent two years at the 
Pestalozzian Yverdun, taking part in the work, appre- 
bending and applying the spirit of Pestalozzi. He has 
declared this experience to be tlie decisive epoch of his 
life. Prof. 0. W. Bennett lias declared the ground 
principle of the Pestalozzian system to be, " From In- 
tuition to Notion/' and with this we may compare Com- 
payre's statement that '^ upon many points Froebel re- 
mained, to the end a faithful disciple of Pestalozzi. 
Intuition is the fundamental principle of Froebel's 
method, and we might say that his effort in pedagogy 
consists chiefly in organizing into a system the sense 
intuitions which Pestalozzi proposed to the child some- 
what at random and without plan.^^ 

Froebers Psychological Basis. Froebel attempted to 
express and systematize those principles of first educa- 
tion which he thought Pestalozzi himself did not fully 
comprehend. His fundamental principle is the develop- 
ment of the self-activity of the child by connecting 
manual labor with every exercise of the intellect. Sully 



FROEBEL AND THE KINDERGARTEiY. 31I 

in his Psycliology says that Froebel " has built on solid 
psychological ground in maintaining (1) That knowl- 
edge and activity are closely related; (2) That the child's 
spontaneous activity is the force that sets the mechanism 
of the senses in movement; (3) That perception includes 
the employment not only of the eye but of the hand; 4. 
That a nice perception of form is only gained in connec- 
tion with the device of manual reproduction. 

The Object of the Kindergarten. This may be stated 
in Froebel's own words: "To take the oversight of chil- 
dren before they are ready for school life; to exert an 
influence over their whole being in correspondence with 
its nature; to strengthen their bodily powers; to exer- 
cise their senses; to employ the awakening mind; to 
make them thoughtfully acquainted with the world of 
nature and of man; to guide their heart and soul in the 
right direction, and to lead them to the Origin of all life 
and to union with Him." 

Opinions of Froebel. An account of the principles of 
Eroebel must be sought for elsewhere. The methods of 
Kindergarten instruction are fully given in the many 
manuals on this subject. In a lecture delivered before 
the College of Preceptors in London, in 1874, Joseph 
Payne took strong ground in favor of the originality 
and worth of Froebel. He said: " Among the names of 
the great Keformers of Education there is one which 
has not yet received that honor which it deserves, and 
with which I firmly believe the future will invest it. It 
is that of Frederick Wilhelm August Froebel. It is 
safe to say that both American and English educa- 
tional authorities are increasingly inclined to rate the 



312 ESSAYS ON EDUCATIONAL REEORMERS. 

work of Froebel high. Compayre seems inclined 
(doubtless with natural French dislike of German mys- 
ticism and profundity) to think Froebel overestimated; 
in France at least, and " more praised than known, more 
celebrated than studied." He acknowledges, however, 
Froebel's grand qualities as a teacher. Dr. G. Stanley 
Hall says, '^ If Froebel was mystic and enthusiastic, like 
Delsarte and Jahn, like them he based his system upon 
careful observation of human nature, and the deepest 
eympathy with those he worked for." 



APPENDIX. 



CLASS MATCHES. 

(See page 27.) 

With young classes I have tried the Jesuits' plan of matches, 
and have found it answer exceedingly well. The top boy and 
the second pick up sides (in schoolboy phrase), the second boy 
having first choice. The same sides may be kept till the superi- 
ority of one of them is clearly established, when it becomes nec- 
essary to pick up again. The matches, if not too frequent, prove 
an excellent break to the monotony of school-work. A subject 
well suited for them (as Franklin pointed out) is spelling. The 
boys are told that on a certain day there will be a match in the 
spelling of some particular class of words — say words of one syl- 
lable, or the preterites of verbs. For the match the sides are 
arranged in lines opposite one another; the dux of one side ques- 
tions the dux of the other, the second boy the second, and so 
forth. The match may be conducted mva wee, or, better still, by 
papers previously written. Each boy has to bring on paper a 
list of the right sort of words. Suppose six is the number re- 
quired, he will write a column with a few to spare, as some of 
his words may be disallowed by the umpire, i.e., the master. 
The master^takes the first boy's list, and asks the top boy on the 
opposite side to spell the words. When he fails, the owner of 
the list has to correct him, and gets a mark for doing so. Should 
the owner of the list himself make a mistake, his opponent scores 
even if he is wrong also. When the master has gone through all 
the lists in this way, he adds up the marks, and announces which 

313 



SH APPENDIX. 

side has won. The method has the great merit of stimulating 
the lower end of the form as well as the top; for it usually hap- 
pens that the match is really decided by the lower hoys, who 
make the most mistakes. Of course the details and the subjects 
of such matches admit of almost endless variation. 

WORDS AND THINGS. 

This antithesis between words and things which constantly 
occurs in educational literature, from the sixteenth century 
onward, is not very exact. Sometimes the antithesis so expressed 
is really between the material world and abstract ideas. In this 
case the study of things which affect the senses is opposed to the 
study of grammar, logic, rhetoric, etc. Sometimes by w(y)'d8 is 
understood the expression of ideas in different languages, and by 
things the ideas themselves. This is the antithesis of those wha 
depreciate linguistic study, and say that it is better to acquire 
fresh ideas than various ways of expressing the same idea. Of 
course it may be shown that linguistic study does more for us- 
than merely giving us various ways of expressing ideas, but I 
will not here discuss the matter. Besides the disputants who use 
one or other of these antitheses, many of those who find fault 
with the attention bestowed on words in education, mean gener- 
ally words learned by rote, and not connected with ideas at all. 

Several of our greatest writers have declared in one sense or 
other against * ' words. " First, both in time and importance, we 
have Milton: 

" The end of all learning is to repair the ruins of our first pa- 
rents by regaining to know God aright, and out of that knowl- 
edge to love Him, to imitate Him, to be like Him, as we may the 
nearest by possessing our souls of true virtue, which being united 
to the heavenly grace of faith, makes up the highest perfection. 
But because our understanding can not in this body found itself 
but on sensible things, nor arrive so clearly to the knowledge of 
God, and things invisible as by orderly conning over the visible 
and inferior creature, the same method is necessarily to be fol- 
lowed in all discreet teaching. And seeing every nation affords 



APPENDIX, 315 



not experience and tradition enough for all kinds of learning, 
therefore we are chiefly taught the language of those people who 
have at any time been most industrious after wisdom: so that lan- 
guage is but the instrument conveying to us things useful to be 
known. And though a linguist should pride himself to have all 
the tongues that Babel cleft the world into, yet if he have not 
studied solid things in them, as well as the words and lexicons, 
he were nothing so much to be esteemed a learned man, as any 
yeoman or tradesman completely wise in his mother dialect 
only."* 

Soon after we find Cowley complaining of the loss which chil- 
dren make of their time at most schools, employing, or rather 
casting away, six or seven years in the learning of words only; 
and he designs a school in which things should be taught together 
with language. {Proposition fc/r ihe Advancement of Experimental 
Philosophy.) Both Milton and Cowley wished that boys should 
read such Latin books as would instruct them in husbandry, etc.» 
and so combine linguistic knowledge with "real" knowledge. 

In the fourth book of the "Dunciad," the most consummate 
master of words thus uses his power to satirize verbal education: — 

Then thus since man from beast by words is known, 
Words are man's province, words we teach alone. 
***** 

To ask, to guess, to know, as they commence. 
As fancy opens the quick springs of sense, 
"We ply the memory, we load the brain, 
Bind rebel wit, and double chain on chain, 
Confine the thou2;ht to exercise the breath. 
And keep them in the pale of words till death. 

(Lines 148 ff.) 
Cowper, too, says: — 

And is he well content his son should find 
No nourishment to feed his growing mind 
But conjugated verbs, and nouns declined ? 
For such is all the mental food purveyed 
By public hackneys in the schooling trade* 

* Tract to Hartlib. 



3l6 APPENDIX, 



Who feed a pupil's intellect with store 

Of syntax truly, but with little more; 

Dismiss their cares when they dismiss their flock; 

Machines themselves, and governed by a clock. 

On tlie other side we have Dr. Johnson: — 

" The truth is, that the knowledge of external nature and the 
sciences which that knowledge requires or includes, are not the 
great or the frequent business of the human mind. Whether we 
provide for action or for conversation, whether we wish to be 
useful or pleasing, the first requisite is the religious and moral 
knowledge.of right and wrong : the next is an acquaintance with 
the history of mankind, and with those examples which may be 
said to embody truth and prove by events the reasonableness of 
opinions. Prudence and justice are virtues and excellences of all 
times and of all places; we are perpetually moralists, but we are 
geometricians only by chance. Our intercourse with intellect, 
not nature, is necessary; our speculations upon matter are volun- 
tary and at leisure. Physiological learning is of such rare emer- 
gence, that one may know another half his life without being able 
to estimate his skill in hydrostatics or astronomy; but his moral 
and prudential character immediately appears. Those authors, 
therefore, are to be read at schools that supply most axioms of pru- 
dence, most principles of moral truth, and most materials for 
conversation; and these purposes are best served'by poets, orators, 
and historians."* 

In more recent times the increasing importance of natural 
science has drawn many of the best intellects into its service. 
Linguistic and literary instruction now finds few supporters in 
theory, though its friends have not yet made much alteration in 
their practice. Our last two School Commissions have recom- 
mended a compromise between the claims of literature and nat- 
ural science. Both reports state clearly the importance of a train- 
ing in language and literature, to which our present theorists 
hardly seem to do justice. The Public Schools Report says: — 

" Grammar is the logic of common speech, and there are few 

* Life of Milton. 



APPENDIX. 317 



educated men who are not sensible of the advantages they gained, 
as boys, from the steady practice of composition and translation, 
and from their introduction to etymology. The study of litera- 
ture is the study, not indeed of the physical, but of the intellect- 
ual and moral world we live in, and of the thoughts, lives, and 
characters of those men whose writings or whose memories suc- 
ceeding generations have thought it worth while to preserve, "* 

The Commissioners on Middle Schools express a similar opin- 
ion: — 

' ' The * human ' subjects of instruction, of which the study of 
language is the beginning, appear to have a distinctly greater 
educational power than the 'material.' As all civilization really 
takes its rise in human intercourse, so the most efficient instru- 
ment of education appears to be the study which most bears on 
that intercourse, the study of human speech. Nothing appears 
to develop and discipline the whole man so much as the study 
which assists the learner to understand the thoughts, to enter 
into the feelings, to appreciate the moral judgments of others. 
There is nothing so opposed to true cultivation, nothing so unrea- 
sonable, as excessive narrowness of mind; and nothing con- 
tributes to remove this narrowness so much as that clear under- 
standing of language which lays open the thoughts of others to 
ready appreciation. Nor is equal clearness of thought to be ob- 
tained in any other way. Clearness of thought is bound up with 
clearness of language, and the one is impossible without the 
other. "When the study of language can be followed by that of 
literature, not only breadth and clearness, but refinement becomes 
attainable. The study of history in the full sense belongs to a 
still later age: for till the learner is old enough to have some 
appreciation of politics, he is not capable of grasping the mean- 
ing of what he studies. But both literature and history do but 
carry on that which the study of language has begun, the culti- 
vation of all those faculties by which man has contact with 
man."f 

* Public Schools Report, vol. i., § 8, p. 28. 
+ Middle Schools Report, vol. i., c. iv., p. 22, 



3l8 APPENDIX. 

FROM THE "EVENING HOUR OF A HERMIT." 

(See page 172.) 

What man is, what he needs, what elevates him and degrades 
him, what strengthens him and weakens him, such is the knowl- 
edge needed both by shepherds of the people, and by the inmate 
of the most lowly hut. 

Everywhere humanity feels this want. Everywhere it struggles 
to satisfy it with labor and earnestness. For the want of it men 
live restless lives, and at death tbey cry aloud that they have not 
fulfilled the purposes of their being. Their end is not the ripen- 
ing of the perfect fruits of the year, which in full completion are 
laid away for the repose of the winter. . . . 

The powers of conferring blessings on humanity are not a gift 
of art or of accident. They exist with their fundamental princi- 
ples in the inmost nature of all men. Their development is the 
universal need of humanity. 

Central point of life, individual destiny of man, thou art the book 
of Nature. In thee lieth the power and the plan of that wise 
teacher; and every school education not erected upon the princi- 
ples of human development leads astray. 

The happy infant learns by this road what his mother is to him; 
and thus grows within him the actual sentiment of love and grati- 
tude before he can understand the words Duty or Thanks. . . . 
The truth which rises from our inmost being is universal human 
truth, and would serve as a truth for the reconciliation of those 
who are quarreling by thousands over its husks. 

Man, it is thyself, the inner consciousness of thy powers, 
which is the object of the education of nature. 

The general elevation of these inward powers of the human 
mind to a pure human wisdom is the universal purpose of the 
education even of the lowest man. The practice, application, 
and use of these powers and this wisdom under special circum- 
stances and conditions of humanity, is education for a profes- 



APPENDIX. 319 



sional or social condition. These riiist always be kept subordi- 
nate to the general object of human training. . . . 

Nature develops all the human faculties by practice, and their 
growth depends upon their exercise. . . . 

Men, fathers, force not the faculties of your children into paths 
too distant before they have attained strength by exercise; and 
avoid harshness and over-fatigue. . , . 

(You leave the right order) when, before making them sensi- 
tive to truth and wisdom by the real knowledge of actual objects, 
you engage them in the thousand-fold confusions of word-learning 
and opinions; and lay the foundation of their mental character 
and of the first determination of their powers, not with truth and 
actual obligations, but with sounds and speech and words. . , . 

God is the nearest resource for humanity. . , . 

To suffer pain and death and the grave, without God, thy 
nature, educated to mildness, goodness, and feeling, has no 
power. ... 

Believe in thyself , O man; believe in the inward intelligence 
of thine own soul; thus shalt thou believe in God and immor- 
tality. 
. Faith in the fatherhood of God is faith in immortality. . . . 

Faith in my own father, who is a child of God, is a training for 
my faith in God. 

Faith in God sanctifies and strengthens the bond between par- 
ents and children, between subjects and princes. Unbelief dis- 
solves all bonds, destroys all blessing. 

Freedom rests on justice, justice on love; therefore even free- 
dom rests on love. 

The true disposition of the child is the right source of freedom 
resting on justice, as the true disposition of the father is the 
source of all power of government which is exalted enough to do 
justice and to love freedom. And the source of justice and of all 
blessing for the world, the source of love and brotherly feeling 
among men, rests on the great thought of religion that we are 
children of God, and that belief of this truth is the sure ground 
of all blessing for the world. 



320 APPENDIX. 



That men have lost the disposition of children toward God is 
the greatest misfortune of the world, inasmuch as it renders im- 
possible all God's fatherly education of them; and the restoring 
of this lost childlike disposition is the redemption of the lost 
children of God upon earth. 

The Man of God who, with suffering and death, restored ta 
mankind the universally lost feeling of the child's disposition 
toward God, is the Redeemer of the World, He is the great sac- 
rificed Priest of the Lord. He is the Mediator between God and 
God-forgetting mankind. His teaching is pure justice, educating 
people's philosophy; it is the revelation of God to His lost race 
of children. 

FROM RAMSAUER. 

(One of Pestalozzi's Assistants. See page 180). 

As many hundred times in the course of the year as foreigners, 
visited the Pestalozzian Institution, so many hundred times did 
Pestalozzi allow himself in his enthusiasm to be deceived by 
them. On the arrival of every fresh visitor, he would go to the 
teachers in whom he placed most confidence, and say to them, 
"This is an important personage, who wants to become ac- 
quainted with all we are doing. Take your best pupils and their 
analysis-books (copy-books in which the lessons were written 
out), and show him what we can do, and what we wish to do." 
Hundreds and hundreds of times there came to the Institution 
silly, curious, and often totally uueducated persons, who came 
because it was the fashion. On their account we usually had to 
interrupt the class instruction, and hold a kind of examination. 
In 1814, the aged Prince Esterhazy came. Pestalozzi ran all 
over the house, calling out, "Ramsauer, Ramsauer, where are 
you ! Come directly, with your best pupils, to the Maison Rouge 
(the hotel at which the Prince had alighted). He is a person of 
the highest importance and of infinite wealth; he has thousands 
of serfs in Hungary and Austria. He is certain to build schools 
and set free his serfs, if he is made to take an interest in the mat- 



APPENDIX 321 



ter." I took about fifteen pupils to the hotel. Pestalozzi pre- 
sented me to the Piiuce with these words, '• This is the teacher 
of these scholars, a young man who, fifteen years ago, migrated 
-with other poor children from the Canton of Appeuzell and 
came to me. He received an elementary education according to 
his aptitudes, without let or hindrance. Now he is a teacher 
himself. Thus you see that there is as much ability in the poor 
as in the richest, frequently more, but it is seldom developed, and 
even then not methodically. It is for this reason that the im- 
provement of the popular schools is so highly important. But 
he will show you everything we do better than I could. I will, 
therefore, leave him with you for the present." I now examined 
the pupils, taught, explained, and bawled, in my zeal, till I was 
quite hoarse, believing that the Prince was thoroughly convinced 
about everything. At the end of an hour Pestalozzi returned. 
The Prince expressed his pleasure at what he had seen. He 
then took leave, and Pestalozzi, standing on the top of the stairs 
of the hotel, said, "He is quite convinced, quite convinced, and 
will certainly establish schools on his Hungarian estates." When 
we had descended the stairs, Pestalozzi said, " Whatever ails my 
arm ! It is so painful I Why, see, it is quite swollen; I can't 
bend it!" And in truth his wide sleeve was now too small for 
his arm. I looked at the key of the house-door of the Maison 
Rouge, and said to Pestalozzi, " Look here ! you struck yourself 
against this key when we were going to the Prince an hour ago I" 
On closer observation, it appeared that Pestalozzi had actually 
bent the key by hitiing his elbow against it. In the first hour 
afterward he had not noticed the pain for the excess of his zeal 
and his joy.* 

HELPS, STEPHEN, ETC. 

Mr. Helps, in his admirable essay on reading, in "Friends in 
Council," makes some observations which, although they refer 

♦ For a full account of Ramsauer, see Barnard's Pestalozzi. 



322 APPENDIX, 



to the reading of grown persons, may be applied to early educa 
tion as well. He would have everj^ one " take something for the 
main stem and trunk of their culture, whence branches might 
grow out in all directions, seeking light and air for the parent 
tree, which it is hoped might end in becoming something useful 
and ornamental, and which, at any rate, all along will have had 
life and growth in it." 

He concludes his remarks on the connection of knowledges as 
follows : — 

" In short, all things are so connected together that a man who 
knows one subject well can not, if he would, have failed to have 
acquired much besides; and that man will not be likely to keep 
fewer pearls who has a string to put them on, than he who picks 
them up and throws them together without method. This, how- 
ever, is a very poor metaphor to represent the matter ; for what I 
would aim at producing, not merely holds together what is gained, 
but has vitality in itself— is always growing. And anybody will 
confirm this who, in his own case, has had any branch of study 
or human affairs to wOrk upon; for he must have observed how 
all he meets seems to work in with, and assimilate itself to, his 
own peculiar subject. During his lonely walks, or in society, or 
in action, it seems as if this one pursuit were something almost 
independent of himself, always on the watch, and claiming its 
share in whatever is going on." 

Sir James Stephen also made some excellent remarks to the 
same effect in his lecture on " Desultory and Systematic Read- 
ing," delivered at Exeter Hall : — 

" By sound — that is solid — learning " (he said), " I mean such 
knowledge as relates to useful and substantial things, and as in 
itself is compact, coherent, all of a piece— having its several parts 
fitted into each other, and mutually sustaining and illustrating 
one another." 

We must with a firm hand draw our own meridian line in the 
world of learning: — 

" For learning is a world, not a chaos. The various accumula- 
tions of human knowledge are not so many detached masses. 



APPENDIX. 323 



They are all connected parts of one great system of tnitb, and 
though that system be infinitely too comprehensive for any one 
of us to compass, yet each component member of it bears to 
every other component member relations which each of us may, 
in his own department of study, search out and discover for him- 
self. A man is really and soundly learned in exact proportion 
to the number and to the importance of those relations which he 
has thus carefully examined and accurately understood," 

In discussing the advantage of learning one subject thoroughly, 
we must not overlook the valuable testimony of Professor De 
Morgan : — 

' * When the student has occupied his time in learning a mod- 
erate portion of many different things, what has he acquired — 
extensive knowledge or useful habits ? Even if he can be said 
to have varied learning, it will not long be true of him, for noth- 
ing flies so quickly as half -digested knowledge; and when this is 
gone, there remains but a slender portion of useful power. A 
small quantity of learning quickly evaporates from a mind which 
never held any learning except in small quantities; and the intel- 
lectual philosopher can perhaps explain the following phenom- 
enon — that men who have given deep attention to one or more 
liberal studies, can learn to the end of their lives, and are able to 
retain and apply very small quantities of other kinds of knowl- 
edge; while those who have never learnt much of any one thing, 
seldom acquire new knowledge after they attain to years of ma- 
turity, and frequently lose the greater part of that which they 
once possessed." 

I am indebted for this quotation to Mr. Payne's pamphlet, 
"The Curriculum of Modern Education, etc.," 1866. This 
pamphlet contains a most interesting discussion of the questions 
— Many subjects or few ? and. Shall language or science have 
precedence? In considering these matters, Mr. Payne has an 
advantage possessed at present by very few Englishmen— knowl- 
edge derived both from teaching, and from studying the theory 
of teaching. Vide his evidence before Middle Schools Commis- 



324 APPENDIX. 



DR. WIESE. 

As far as iitevature is concerned, the Reformers have heen as 
triumphant lately in education as in politics. Indeed, it seems 
considered almost axiomatic that he who writes on a liberal edu- 
cation must himself be a Liberal.* Some of these writers hardly 
justify Mr. Mill's remark, that all stupid people are Tories, and 
some others, in tilting at the present state of things, endeavor as 
it were to make up by velocity for want of weight. But there 
are other malcontents who are not rhetoricians, and who are 
among the intellectual leaders of our time. Vf e can not afford to 
neglect protests from men so eminent, and observing from such 
different standing-points, as Mill, Spencer, Tyudall, Huxley, 
Seeley, Matthew Arnold. Some of these gentlemen are not 
merely dissatisfied with English education, but think they have 
found in Germany a model worthy of our imitation. When they 
descend in this manner from the ideal to the actual, we Philis- 
tines f feel more at home with them. We like to see in a con- 
crete form what the Reformers would introduce, and when we 
are thus convinced that the change would be for the better, we 
no longer feel any misgivings in adopting it. But in all such 
cases we must be very careful that the superiority of the thing 
to be introduced is clearly demonstrated ; and in listening to the 
admirers of foreign systems we sometimes wish for an opportu- 
nity of following out the maxim Audi alteram partem. Perhaps 
we remember that in our nursery experiences, the good little boy 
next door was frequently referred to as presenting a striking con- 



* There are a few noteworthy exceptions to this rule, as Professor Con- 
ington and Mr. Church, who are both brave enough to defend Latin verses. 
See Contemporary Review, January and May, 1868. 

1 1 hope I shall not be understood as ranking myself among the enemies 
of light or Geist or ideas, still less among the enemies of the "children of 
light" who are so well represented in this country by Mr. Arnold. I mean 
merely that I have no pretensions to be of their number, and tiiat I can 
never aspire beyond being admitted as a rtroselyte of the Gate. 



APPENDIX. 325 



trast with our own unworthiness, while perhaps in the adjacent 
nursery we were figuring in the same capacity for the humilia- 
tion of the good little boy himself. After listening to the praises 
of the good little German boy who is such a prodigy of learning, 
and, as Mr. Mathias has shown, is required to pass a harder ex- 
amination on leaving school than our pollmen are when they 
leave the University, I take a malicious pleasure in being present 
(so to speak) at a lecture delivered for the benefit of that young 
gentleman, in which his failings are freely touched upon in con- 
nection with the English boy's corresponding virtues. 

1 refer to Dr. V/iese's " Letters on English Education." (Eng- 
lish by W. D. Arnold, 1854.) Dr. Wiese is, I believe, a very 
good authority, and he is referred to with much respect in Mr. 
Matthew Arnold's Report. It is very instructive to compare his 
remarks on the comparative merits of English and German edu- 
cation with what our own authorities have said on the subject. 
For the benefit of those of my readers who have not ready access 
to the book, I give the following extracts : 

"The differences that exist between the objects and attain- 
ments of the systems of instruction in use in the English public 
schools and our gymnasia may be summed up as exhibiting the 
contrast between skill and science {Konnen und Wissen), practice 
and knowledge. The knowledge of the English scholar is lim- 
ited to a narrower circle than that of the German ; but he will 
generally be found to move in it with greater accuracy; his knowl- 
edge lies in a narrower compass, but generally serves more as a 
practical power to him."— (p. 59.) 

"I am persuaded that they are right who maintain that what 
the English schools and universities have neglected and do neg- 
lect, is amply compensated by that which they have done and 
are still doing." — (p. 6.) 

"I think I have generally observed, that the English public 
schools, without exception— with all their undeniable shortcom- 
ings—yet do know how to guard and to strengthen :n the rising 
generation the germ of future manhood; whereas we are not in 
a position to repel the reproaches so frequently heaped of late 



326 APPENDIX. 



years on our German schools, ' that they have forgotten their 
business of education, and train up no men for the Common- 
wealth;' though in making this reproach there is much so utterly 
overlooked, as to make it, in the mouths of most people, an un- 
just one. The result of my observations, to state it brie%, is 
this : in knowledge, our higher schools are far in advance of the 
English; but their education is more effective, because it imparts 
a better preparation for life." — (p. 7.) 

" The general impression in England is, that the acquisition of 
knowledge is but the second object of education, and one for 
which opportunity is continually offering through life ; but that 
to enable a young man to seize upon this opportunity, and to 
avail himself of it, the first object of education, viz., formation 
of character, must be obtained early; for that deficiency in this 
respect is not so easily supplied in after-life. We Germans 
should reply that it is just in the power of forming character, 
that the excellence of well-regulated scientific instruction con- 
sists; but must we not confess that in numberless cases this re- 
sult has not showed itself in our young men ? Even in Germany 
most teachers maintain that the main object of instruction is 
education ; but does not their confidence, that this object is best 
effected by its own means, too soon degenerate into careless- 
ness?"— (p. 50.) 

" England has the incalculable advantage of possessing a defi- 
nite mode of training, handed down from generation to genera- 
tion, and in all essential points unchanged for centuries ; and, 
above all, the advantages of a fixed central point [Nationality 
and Religion], toward which everything else radiates: we are 
involved in uncertainty, and go on looking and looking for some- 
thing that may remain steadfast: we allow things only valuable 
as means, to assume the importance of ends, and toward these 
all the powers we possess are enthusiastically directed. The con- 
sequence is. alas ! that sooner or later, by the very necessity of 
things, there ensues a reactionary movement in exactly the oppo- 
site direction." — (p. 79.) 

"I have often been struck with the fact that the English are 



APPENDIX. 327 



beginning to fear that the heroic feeling of noble manliness is 
gradually dying out of the nation, and therefore are rather shy 
of making any great alterations in the old system of education at 
the public schools and universities in order to meet the wants of 
modern times; or of making experiments of new systems and 
subjects of study, feeling as they do how much they owe to the 
old system for the rousing and fostering of that vital energy. 
They find that the times most favorable to the formation of strong 
individual character were those in which the means of training 
were simple, and (owing to their small compass) capable perhaps 
of exercising a more certain influence. Therefore they are in 
general far from considering the variety of our German plan of 
study a thing to be envied." — (pp. 55, 56.) 

"The ideality of the German mind, and its leaning toward the 
abstract, makes it feel a respect for knowledge for its own sake, 
such as hardly exists in England; it possesses for us an intrinsic 
value. To take a popular illustration, the knowledge that the 
earth is round, is considered by us valuable on its own account; 
the Englishman receives this result of scientific research with 
equal pleasure ; but chiefly because he associates it with the 
thought of being able to sail round it; he asks, 'How does it 
affect me?' Considerations of profit are doubtless closel}'- allied 
wit^i this mode of thought; but it would be extremely unjust, 
were we on this account to reproach the education of the higher 
schools in England with utilitarianism; it is a cause of complaint 
in many quarters, that they are not utilitarian enough. The 
state of the case is pretty much as follows : in England they look 
to the final object of education, and find this to consist in capa- 
bility for action ; even as our own Wilhelm von Humboldt once 
said, when he was Minister, that there was nothing which the 
State ought so much to encourage amongst its youth, as that 
which had a tendency to promote energy of action. Under this 
belief the English reject everything from their system of instruc- 
tion which may tend to oppress, to overexcite, or to dissipate the 
mental power of the pupil. Their means and methods of instruc- 
tion would appear to the teacher of a German gymnasium sur- 



328 APPENDIX. 



prisiDgly simple, not to sa}'- unscientific; and so in many cases 
they certainly are. The English boy, even when his school train- 
ing is over, would seem generally to know little enough by the side 
of a German; and in certain subjects, such as geography, an Eng- 
lish scholar is not to be compared with a German who has 'been 
taught on rational principles,' and the same may be said of phys- 
ics and other branches of knowledge. With us it is almost a 
standing maxim, that the object of the gymnasium is to awaken 
and develop the scientific mind. An Englishman could not 
admit this, for he is unable to divest himself of the idea, that 
not to know, but to do, is the object of man's life; the vigorous 
independence of each individual man in his own life and call- 
ing. "-(PP- 63 fi.) 

"In the Gymnasia, Herder warned them against the luxury of 
knowledge : and how frequently we hear the reproach, that their 
lessons are such as become a university rather than a school ; and 
that consequently the bo3^s are conceited, premature critics and 
phrasemongers. In England they care only for facts : they reject 
all critical controversy, and desire by the contemplation of facts 
to sharpen the faculty of observation. We, on the other hand, 
too often allow reflection and generalities that cost but little labor, 
to stifle that spirit of research which fixes itself upon its object 
and works toward it with scrupulous impartiality. How many 
a professor has been vexed at finding schoolboys bring to college 
so many cut and dried thoughts and views, and so little well- 
grounded knowledge of simple matters of fact ! Godfrey Her- 
mann complained, 'At school they read authors critically, and 
we must begin at the university to teach them the elements of 
grammar.' I do not know M'hether pride of knowledge is so 
common now in Germany, as it was when Litchenberg spoke of 
it as ' a country in which children learned to turn up their noses 
before they learned to blow them,' but this I do know, that all 
pushing of the powers of thought brings its own punishment 
afterward. If young men are made acquainted before their 
time, and without pains on their part, with those results of 
knowledge which are fitted for a more advanced period of life. 



APPENDIX, 329 



tliey are very likely to use up the stock of enthusiasm, which we 
all need and have received as a kind of dower to carry with us 
through life, and which we can best increase by overcoming dif- 
ficulties for ourselves." — (pp. 66, 67.) 

*' Thus Dr. Arnold says that the effort a boy makes is a 
hundred times more valuable to him than the knowledge ac- 
quired as the result of the effort ; as generally in education the 
How is more important than the Wliat. The consequence of this 
beiug so often forgotten in German schools, of their not suf- 
ficiently guarding against the encyclopaedic tendency of their 
system of study is, that a young man loses not only the natural 
simplicity and coherence of his idea, but yet more his capacity 
to observe, because he has been overcrammed ; his brain becomes 
confused and his ear deafened ; and after all he is obliged to 
bestow his labor rather on account of the extent than the depth 
of the knowledge to be attained. In English schools they have 
hitherto avoided this danger by confining themselves to very 
little ; students there do not learn nearly so much as with us, but 
they learn one thing better, and that is the art of learning. They 
acquire a greater power of judging for themselves ; they know 
how to take a correct starting-point for other studies ; whereas 
our young men too often only know just what they have learnt, 
and never cease to be dependent on their school-teaching," — 
<pp. 68, 69.) 

" It can not be denied that the maxim, ' non scliolm sed mtw,' is 
better understood in England than in Germany. All that a school 
can teach, beyond imparting a certain small stock of knowledge, 
is the way to learn. It is a lamentable misconception of that most 
important maxim, to suppose that a liberal education can have 
any other end in view, than to impart and exercise power to be 
used in after life."— (p. 76.) 

"I am persuaded that we must soon make up our minds once 
more to simplify our course of study, and the regulations for the 
last school examination {Ari'-'Hrientenexamen)." — (p. 77.) 

"Were it possible to combine the German scientific method 
with the English power of forming the character, we should 



330 APPENDIX. 

attain an idea of education not yet realized in Christian times, 
only once realized perhaps in any time — in the best days of 
Greece ; but which is just the more difficult to attain now, in 
proportion as the spirit of Christianity is more exalted than any- 
thing which antiquity could propose to itself as the end of edu- 
cation."— (p. 209.) 



INDEX OF NAMES AND SUBJECTS. 



N. B. — For additional references see " Table of Contents.*^ 



^sop, 278. 

AU is in all, 216. 

Amusement with instruction, 103. 

Arithmetic, 198. 

Arnold, influence as master, 89, 

Arnold, in history, 285. 

Ascham's branches of study, 43. 

method, 41. 

"Scholemaster," 40. 

method in Latin, 43. 

. — double translation, 44. 
Associations for study, 28. 
Attention, how secured, 31. 
Austn, Miss, 228. 
Authority of parents, 94. 

B 

Barnard, 308. 

Basedow and the Philanthropin, 144. 

a prince of innovators, 146. 

, his frieud.s. 147. 

influenced by Rousseau, 145. 

, life of, 14^. 

Basedow's "Elementary," 150. 

method. 151. 

mistake, 152. 

Philanthropin, 150. 

Biography for children, 288. 



Cambridge man, the, 225, 229. 
Childhood and youth, difference of, 
186. 

, distinction between, 143. 

Children and suffering, 135 

not understood by adults, 121. 

reading, 104. 

■ . reasoning with. 101. 

Christopher and Alice, 174. 



Citizenship, training for, 244. 
Classical authors not suited to 1)076^ 

78. 
Class matches, 313. 
Comenius and DeGeer, 66. 

and Oxenstiern, 67. 

as philosopher and sch^olma*- 

ter, 71. 

at Elbing, 68. 

, early years of, 60. 

in London, 64. 

in Holland, 71. 

in Sweden, 70. 

writes the Janua, 63. 

Comenius' banishment, 61. 

four kinds of schools, 78 

last years, 71. 

Orbis Pictus. 69. 

pecuniary difficulties, 68. 

principles, 72. 

reforms, general character of, 

80. 

scheme of universal knowledge, 

63. 

teaching of languages, 77. 

Composition, improper themes for, 

109. 

le.ssons, 281. 

Consciousness, first dawn of, 194. 

Conservative and reformer, 114. 

Conversation. Latin taught by. 46. 

Corporal punishment, 96. 

Cowper, 315. 

Cowley, 315. 

Ciiltiv'ation of affections, 19». 



Definite aims in teaching, 34. 
Desire for knowledge, 140. 

of learning to be fostered, ?8. 

Developing tl'.eory, 303. 



332 INDEX OF NAMES AND SUBJECTS. 



Development of the afiections, 193. 

faculties, 192. 

Dictation lessous, 280. 
Didactica Magnti. 61. 

, Comenius', 63-73. 

, summary of, 73. 

Didactic teaching, 214, 215. 
Dirxiculties sometimes to be raised, 

108. 
BLsputation, Locke on, 110. 
Dominies, 297. 
Double translation, 44. 
Drawing, 248, 
Drummottd, 302. 

E 
Early education, 117, 184. 

, blunders in, 188. 

Edgeworlh, 259. 

Education as development, 185. 

a superintendence. 193. 

, mo/al and physical. 267. 

of Emile, scientific, 138. 

negative, 116. 

sometimes sacrifices childhood, 

120. 

, Spencer's Intellectual, 252. 

, Spencer's principles of, 254- 

259. 

, three-fold source of, 120. 

, too hnguistic, 46. 

, vireakuess of modern, 226. 

, who shall discuss, 234. 

Educaticnal importance of biogra- 
phy, 246. 
Emile, Rousseau's. 115. 
Empirical knowledge. 243. 
Emulation in instruction, 27. 
Ends of study, 221. 
Epitomes, 283. 

Evening Hour of a Hermit, 318. 
Examinations by Jesuits, 33. 
Experimental introduction, 260. 



Facts which are to be remembered, 

227. 
Faculties, development of, 192. 
Fine arts. 247. 

Firmness, Rousseau on, 135. 
Froe'.iel and Pestalozzi, 310. 

opinions on, 311. 

Froebel's Study of nature, 303-312. 
Froude, 303. 



Genesis of knowledge, 260. 

Gtoethe, 147. 

in Basedow, 148. 



Grammatical learning, objections 

to, 82. 
Grammar to be made pleasing, 37. 



Hamilton and' Locke, 85. 
Harris. W. T.. 308. 
Harshness not to be used, 100. 
Hartlib and Milton, 57. 
Health, care of, 34. 

maxims, 93. 

Helps. 321. 

Historv. studv of, 245. 

Humboldt, 327. 

I 
Ideal ends, 268. 
Idea, then word, 197. 
Ideality of Germans. 327. 
Ignorance, an allowable, 283. 
Ignorant, art of being, 116. 
Imparting iheoiy, 303. 
Iimov-ators. the, 49 
Instruction and amusement, 200. 

and pleasure, 262. 

necessary, 212. 

Intellect and routine. 265. 

Interest, how exc.-ited, 273, 284, 271, 

201. 
Intuition. 806. 
Investigation, 233. 

J 
Jacotot at Louvain. 206. 

on connections of knowledge, 

217. 

on empty words, 219. 

on memoi-v. 2l8. 

Jacotot "s all is in all, 216. 

four commands, 230. 

life, 205. 

methods. 204. 

methods of lecturing. 205. 

method in tlie motlier-toneue, 

232. 

Model Book, 220. 

Paradox. 2()8 

, examined, 209. 

" Janua, the," in English, 81. 

. character of. 83. 

Jesuit school.^, importance of, 21. 

, Bacon on. 21. 

, great influence of, 22. 

. defects of, 35. 

Johnson, Dr , 316. 
Judgment, cultivation of, 139. 

K 
Kindergarten and infant schools, 304. 

, object of, 311. 

■ , spread of, 307-309. 



INDEX OF NAMES AND SUBJECTS. 333 



Knowledge and a livelihood, 240. 

• ami power. "Zih. 

of most worib, 237. 

unors-anizable, 2v;8. 

versus power, 225. 



Languages, gate of, unlocked, 80. 
, how 10 he le.uMied, 107 

to i)e learned separately, 77. 

Latin and Greek. 253 

and French, Locke on, 105, 

yrraniinar, 2.")7. 

, how taught l)y Jesuits, 30. 

necessary to a gentleman, 105. 

. Ratich's method in, .55. 

to be taught by conversation, 

105. 153. 

Learn, repeat, reflect, verify, 230. 

Learning not always to be remem- 
bered, 220. 

to be made pleasant, 37. 

thoroughly. 217. 

Leipzig, model lesson in, 276. 

Leonard and (iertrude, 173. 

Lewis. John, 247. 

Liberiy h hi. Rousseau, 132, 138. 

desirable, ]3tj 

Locke and Hamilton, 85. 

on education by a tutor, 86. 

• on health mi.\-ims, 93. 

on Latin and French, 105. 

on (ireek, 11. 

on manners. 99. 

on music. 111. 

on parents' authority, 94. 

on physic, 92 

on physical education, 91. 

on physics, 111. 

on public schools, 86. 

on self-denial, !I4. 

on virtue and good manners, 88. 

Locke's " Thoughts on Education," 
86. 

" Thoughfs." summary of, 112. 

nodou of school training, 90. 

M 
Macaulay, 286. 
Manners, Locke on. 99. 
Master, influence of, 201. 
Memory, improv mentof, 109. 

may be trained without books, 

129. 
Method. pvpry*hing first in rudi- 
mentMrv outline, 74. 

aims at derelopment, 139. 

]^Iethods of .Jps'u'fs, 27. 
Mill, J. S., 240, 246. 



Milton and Hartlib, 57. 

and the innovators, 58. 

on education, 57. 

Milton's relation to Comenius, 84. 
Moral and religious training, S3. 

atmosphere, 297. 

education, 290. 

Wozart, 229. , . 
Jiusic, 248. 249. ' 
and drawing, 126. 

N 
Nature and self-preservation, 239. 
Nutui-al bent, nothing against, 104. 
Nature does nothing per saltern, 75. 
, every according to, 154. 



Object lessons— three great classes. 

Observation and memory, 195. 
Offspring, rearing of, 243. 
Orbis Pictus. 69. 
, relation to Janua, 83. 



Painting, 248, 249. 
Payne, Joseph, 232. 
Payne on .Jacotot. 204. 
Penmanship atid drawing, 104. 
Pestalozzian practice, 275. 
Pestalozziauism, 184. 
Pestalozzi and agriculture, 166. 

andKrusi, 181. 

, greatest of reformers, 162. 

, merits of, 189. 

on mother's duties. 191. 

on object-lessons, 179. 

at Yverdun, 181. 

, what may be learned from, 201. 

Pestalozzi" s famous books, 172, 174. 

gloomy years. 171. 

hatred of injustice, 164. 

high views. 191. 

last years. 183. 

Leonard and Gertrude, 173, 

love affairs. 167. 

marriage. 169. 

school at Stanz, 176. 

sympathy with the poor, 170. 

system, root of, 190, 

youth. 163. 

Philanthropin a good infant school, 
158, 

, Kant on. 161. 

, later history of, 160. 

. vi.sit to, 154. 

founded at Dessau, 150. 

Physiology, 239. 
Pictures, 275. 



334 



INDEX OF NAMES AND SUBJECTS. 



Play and instruction, 125. 
Pleasure, 272. 
Plutarch, 288. 
Poetry, 280. 

, Spencer on, 2^18. 

Popularity of Jesuit schools, 36. 
Power the end of study, 222. 

of the old-fashioned teaching, 

224, 
Preparatory schools, 187. 
Punishments, 34. 

, natural, 136. 

Pupils as companions, 296. 



Ramsauer, 320. 

on Pestalozzi, 180. 

Riitich, the chief of innovators, 55. 

piotests against bondage to 

Latin, 52. 

, summary of methods of, 50. 

, character of, 50. 

Ratich's method like Ascham's, 56. 

method in Latin, 55. 

originality, 53. 

seven maxims, 54. 

wonderful discovery, 51. 

biojrraphy, 51. 

Ratio studiorum, 23. 
Rational knowledge, 243. 
Reading: books. 282. 

, Rousseau on, 129. 

and writing, Jacotot's method, 

231. 
Reasoning with children. 101. 
Reformers of grammar, 39. 
Repetition the mother of learning, 

m. 
Reformation, effect of, 49. 
Religion and worship, 300. 

in Germany, 299. 

Religious education, 290. 299. 

Results of pubhc school training, 90. 

Rewards and punishments, 98. 

Robinsoe Crusoe, 132. 

Rossetti. 247. 

Rousseau and Robinson Crusoe, 132. 

, impracticable scheme of. 119. 

on art of beiny: ignorant, 116. 

on liberty, 132. 

on moral education, 131, 

on ordinary instruction, 126. 

©n reading, 129. 

Rousseau's fixed principles, 114. 

• freedom in childhood, 116. 

the ideal boy, 118. 

radicalism, 115. 

wisdom, 119. 

Rules, how to be acquired, 39. 



Schoolmasters, denunciation of. 193. 

Scliool teaching usually fails, 270. 

Science and disciphue, 236. 

leads to precision, 138. 

, money value of, 243. 

not to be universally studied, 

249. 

of education, 252. 

, the principles of, to be discov- 
ered, 211. 

Seasons of ap itude, 99. 

Seasons of depression, 97, 

Seeley, Prof., 226. 

Self activity, 141. 

Self-denial from the cradle, 94. 

Self-development, 261. 

Self-respect in education, 29. 

School hours, 29. 

Self -teaching, 140, 233. 

Senses, the, and artistic training, 
199. 

Sense activity, 124. 

training, 125. 

Severity improper, 95. 

Spencer's education, 234, 

principles, 254. 255, 259, 260. 

Spencer on drawing, 248. 

on historj', 245. 

on leisure, 246. 

on music, 248. 

on painting-, 248. 

on national knowledge, 243. 

on relative value of subjects, 

2.'J0, 251 . 

on science, 241. 

on training citizens, 24i 

Stanley, Lord, 225. 

Stephen, 321. 

Study, end of, is power. 224. 

Subjects of instruction in Jesuit 
schools, 28. 

Subjects, three great classes of, 209. 

Supervision of Jesuit schools, 24. 



Teacher must know what he teaches, 

212. 
Teacher, true attitude of, 294, 
Teachers, two kinds of, 292. 
Teachers' threefold function, 122. 
Teaching as superintendence, 214. 

, function of, 123. 

profession of, narrowing, 294. 

unproductive, 47. 

Theory find practice, 266. 
Things, together with words, 77. 
Trade, learning a, 141, 
Travel, 288. 



INDEX OF NAMES AND SUBJECTS. 



335 



Tutor, qualifications of, 101. 

, proper work of, 102. 

Twelve years, Rousseau on, 137. 
Tj-ndail, ^'G7. 

U 
Understanding, what it is, 238. 
University men, 2G9. 
Unscientific teaching, 257. 



W 
Weir, 276. 
Weise, Dr., 324. 
Words and things, 314. 
Wordsworth, 212, 295. 
Worth of different subject^,Ji36. 



Yverdun. Institute at, formed, 18L 



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